So. I don’t know about you guys, but during these tough times when a person with even partial cognitive responsibilities is staying the fuck to the house, mealtimes have become the dominant time of each day. Me—I awaken thinking what’s for lunch and during lunch…I plot and plan dinner.
During one of those plottings I got caught-up in thoughts of Nawlins with visions of oysters and gumbo and beignets, oh my, after which I was craving that holy trinity. I told the Squirt how I was thinking of a trip to the Big Easy where we could eat to our heart’s desire. I told her, I said, “We’ll start over to the Acme oyster House for lunch, after our plane drops us off at 10:30, then to Mother’s for gumbo and fried chicken, fried…fucking…chicken ba-by. Up early the next morning and the three of us take a brisk walk over to Café du Monde for powder sugar dusted donuts. Whadda ya think, huh kid?”
“I think you’ve lost your fucking mind. But donuts would be nice.”
Donuts would be nice and then my brain skipped back to 1964 when my buddy’s mother made us homemade donuts. Canned biscuits made into donut shapes, fried in lard then put in a paper bag with Powdered Sugar. Loved them so much they became my go-to dessert for dinner-with-a-date from college until maybe my sixth marriage.
“Don’t worry Squirtie girl, I’ve got an idea. Let’s see if we can find some ingredients.”
We banged around the kitchen in every cupboard and ended reorganizing the walk-in pantry in search of those ingredients. I had a flashback to childhood memory and a good cry for my now deceased sister. She called food makings “groodents” and dessert “pic-snack”. I’m wiping my snotty nose on my tee shirt as I move shit around the pantry and the Squirt is sitting, passing judgment on whatever I hold out for our confections.
“Are you shitting me?” she responded when I showed her a bag of lentil flower we brought south from Santa Fe four years ago. “That shit was a bad idea for poosas and even worse for donuts.”
Then I showed her rice flour. “How about this, kiddo. Twelve billion Asians can’t be that far off the mark.”
In response, she looked at me like I’d just eaten a turd and walked away. I did find the powdered sugar for dusting and some Coconut Oil to fry. As for the dough, long story short, thirty minutes in front of the dairy case over to Kroger yielded one can of Annie’s Crescent Dinner Rolls and what we ended up with was the best fried dough confection ever invented. Big brag, but try them before you scold. Here it is:
- Crescent dinner rolls that are pre-shaped into a triangle, perhaps an isosceles triangle but perhaps not, I used Annie’s and subsequent fryings bore this out.
- Coconut oil—use a good one and don’t substitute.
- Powdered sugar.
Put a third-inch of coconut oil into a small non-stick pan and bring to at least 350 degrees (I think 350 would be tops because these things cook quickly. You want them cooked crispy outside but not dry inside. We cooked all of ours out to the side burner of the grill to not heat and grease smoke inside La Casa Johnson de Denton. As reinforcement to that whole “best ever” brag, the entire batch of eight pastries were consumed as soon as they were cool enough to eat, the three of us sweating our balls off next to the grill).
Open the package of rolls—always a fun time—and place them flat side down in the oil. Don’t make donut shapes, silly, we’re making beignets, simply lay them flat side down and don’t crowd the pan. Brown the first side then flip, I used chopsticks at Squirt’s suggestion. Expect the little suckers to puff up fatter than Trump’s pouty lips, and just a quickly.
Place half the small bag of sugar in a large bowl, okay and this should have been done before slipping the first triangle into the pan. When the pastry is browned on both sides you put them into the sugar and roll them around. After they are covered on all sides, dust them off and put on a clean plate. As soon as the first one is cool enough to not burn a hole in your face, grab it, sit down, and take a big bite. I never made it to sit and the Squirt never gives Yoda a break.
“Holy shit, Mooner. This is the best thing I ever tasted. I don’t think we have enough for the goat dog. Besides, he’s got no palate, he eats crab grass and varnished table legs.”
She was right. The coconut oil and cooking the dough in its flat state worked some magic, but Yoda is mine no matter. And upon further thought, it would be an absolute bitch to try to cook these suckers on their edges.
Anyhoos, enjoy and thank me later. So fuck Walmart, Trump and his ilk, and a bunch of others. Up next?:
Mooner invents Ghee-poached garlicky chicken liver pate’. Recipe to follow.
