As I found myself standing over a newly purchased fryer at 1 a.m. last night, I couldn’t help but laugh. My high school years were filled with requests for my mom to please make her fried rice or eggrolls for some potluck. At the time I did not think about the late night or early morning that it would cause her, especially when I would forget to ask her in advance and she would inevitably have to defrost something to make the dish requested. So here I was, with short notice to help make churros. I had never made churros, didn’t have a recipe, and of course, this counts for a grade in her Spanish class. I could see that this was the start of payback for all my years of being a kitchen airhead.
Thank goodness for the internet! A quick google search gave me a few recipes to start with. Unfortunately they all required a fryer or at least an oil thermometer so that I can regulate the heat. Fortunately there is a kitchen store in the outlets near us and we slid in just before closing.
With our newly acquired fryer, we thought fried chicken wings would be a logical choice for dinner. I’ve made plenty with our last fryer and they were quick and easy so I could focus on the churros. Disaster struck. The wings were not frying like they should be. It looked like this fryer had a lower max temp than the last one. Instead of 8 minutes a batch, it was taking 25. I sent my sweet husband and dear daughter out to walk the dog and I suddenly realized that I completely missed the dot on the temperature and while I thought I was frying at 375 degrees, it was actually more like 225! After a self-inflicted “you should have had a V8” slap to the forehead, I switched out the oil and cranked it up to the proper 375. We laughed about it but I was so glad that I figured it out before I tried to drop Churros in there!
So here is the recipe we went with. I’ll have to try it sometime with a Mexican hot chocolate dipping sauce, but that was more than I was ready to tackle at midnight. Instead, I made some extra churros (you know, just to test them to make sure they would be ok for the kids) and served them warm with Breyers Vanilla ice-cream. Oh boy they were good! I hope you enjoy them as much as we did (they were so good we’re making more tonight).
1 cup water 1/3 cup butter 2 tablespoons packed brown sugar ½ teaspoon salt 1 cup all-purpose flour 1 egg ½ teaspoon vanilla Vegetable oil ¼ cup granulated sugar ¾ teaspoon ground cinnamon- In a medium saucepan, combine water, butter, brown sugar, and salt. Bring to boiling over medium heat. Add flour all at once, stirring vigorously with a wooden spoon. Cook and stir until mixture forms a ball and pulls away from the sides of the pan. Remove from heat. Cool for 10 minutes. Add the egg and vanilla, beating well with a wooden spoon.
- Heat 3 inches of oil in a deep saucepan to 375 degrees F. Use a piping bag with a star tip to carefuly pipe 1-inch logs into the oil. If you don’t have a piping bag, you can use a zip-lock bag and snip a corner off. Use a clean pair of scissors to cut the batter and drop them into the oil. Watch out for splattering! Fry a few logs at a time in deep hot oil until golden brown on both sides. Drain on paper towels.
- In a medium bowl (I used a pie tin), combine granulated sugar and cinnamon. Roll warm churros in the cinnamon-sugar mixture to coat.
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