South African Koeksisters

photo by icynorth

- Ready In:
- 50mins
- Ingredients:
- 10
- Serves:
-
4-6
ingredients
-
Syrup
- 250 ml water (1 cup)
- 625 ml white sugar (2 1/2 cups)
- 12 1⁄2 ml lemon juice (2 1/2 tsp.)
- 5 ml vanilla essence (1 tsp.)
-
Dough
- 375 ml cake flour (1 1/2 cups)
- 22 ml baking powder (4 1/2 tsp.)
- 1 ml salt (1/4 tsp.)
- 20 g butter or 20 g margarine
- 150 ml milk (the vanilla soy milk gives added flavor, 5/8 cup) or 150 ml vanilla-flavored soymilk (the vanilla soy milk gives added flavor, 5/8 cup)
- 750 ml canola oil (3 cups)
directions
- Put the water and sugar in a ot and bring to boil on low heat. Stir frequently until the sugar is completely dissolved. Boil for 7 minutes.
- Remove the pot from the stove and stir in the lemon juice and vanilla essence. Put the pot into the fridge.
- Mix the flour, salt, and baking powder thoroughly in a mixing bowl. Break the butter or margarine into small pieces and add to the four mixture. Add the milk. Mix well until a dough is formed.
- Roll the dough out to a thickness of 5 mm (+ or - 1/4 in.). Cut the dough into thin (+ or - 10 mm or 1/2 in.) strips. Take 3 strips and join their ends on one side. Braid the strips to desired koeksister length and join other ends.
- Heat the oil in a pot until fairly hot. Put about 3 koeksisters (or what can fit)at a time in the oil and fry them on both sides until they get a golden-brown color. As you remove the koeksisters for the oil, place them directly ito the syrup from the fridge. It is important to keep the syrup cool, so between soakings, return the syrup to the fridge to maintain its coolness.
- Remove the koeksisters from the syrup and allow the excess syrup to drip off. Place them in the refrigerator to cool and then eat!
Questions & Replies

Reviews
see 3 more reviews
Tweaks
-
You should add a stick of cinnamon and some ginger to the syrup to enhance the flavor. A simple sugar syrup with lemon doesn’t do it justice. It is also better to chill the syrup overnight when adding these ingredients to allow it to infuse better. Additionally without using yeast the dough will be fairly dense. Adding 5g (1 1/2 tsp) of dry active yeast to the dough recipe, kneading it until gluten chains are well formed (perform a windowpane test) and letting it proof for 90 min to 2 hours at room temperature before braiding will create a much lighter more delightful sponge.
RECIPE SUBMITTED BY
Update: We've moved back to the states, and are experiencing the joys of living in Wenatchee, WA for the first time! I'm spending most of my time in the kitchen canning, freezing, and drying fruit now and loving it!
We are a couple, Jason and Mollie, that loves to cook together. We have two wonderful DD's, Enjoli (9) and Emily (7) that make life so much more fun! I, Mollie, studied Nutrition so I try to make most of our meals healthy while still tasting great! Our girls love helping us cook...and eat! We're vegetarian and love eating healthy without missing any flavor! We try to eat mostly vegan, so we have many vegan recipes posted. We are world traveling missionaries and students that have visited many countries and have lived in the States, South Korea, and are currently in the Philippines. So we always need to adjust our menu based on the food available. Zaar has been a tremendous help!
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