Serves 4-6
Ingredients
For the dough:
2 cups cake flour
2 tablespoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
1 large egg
4 tablespoons butter/margarine
150ml of water/milk mixture
Oil for deep frying
For the syrup:
500g sugar
2 cinnamon sticks
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1½ cups of water
juice of one lemon
Method
Syrup:
Prepare the syrup a day ahead (it needs to be very cold).
Dissolve sugar in the water.
Add the spices and lemon juice to this and boil together until thick about 25-30minutes.
Leave the syrup in the fridge overnight.
Dough:
Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together.
Rub in the butter to resemble fine bread crumbs.
Add the milk mixture in the flour and egg mixture and try to form dough. Make sure to add little bits of water if the dough appears too dry or you can also add more flour if it is too sticky.
Work the dough well.
If the dough appears to be lumpy and sticky, continue to work the dough until it makes a ball.
Let the dough rest at room temperature for about two to three hours in an airtight container.
To prepare the koeksisters:
Roll out the dough (thickness 5mm).
Cut the dough into strips of 6cm long, 2cm wide.
Cut each of these strips into three strips (not all the way through, leave the strips connected at the top).
Plate each strip, pinch together at the end of the strip.
Deep fry until golden brown.
Remove and drain quickly – dip the hot koeksisters in the cold syrup (that was stored in the fridge up to now).
The secret is to keep the syrup cold and the koeksisters hot, this way it will draw just the right amount of syrup.
You can keep the syrup cold by placing the syrup bowl in another container filled with iced water or ice cubes.