Loukoumades! 
Loukoumades
Greek donuts
Ingredients
- 250 g AP flour (2 cups) some prefer bread flour
- 220 g water (7/8 cup)
- 12 g sugar (3 tsp)
- 10 g active yeast (1 tbsp + 1/4 tsp)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract, or 1 whole scraped vanilla bean
- 30 g oil (2 tbsp + 1/2 tsp)
- 2 g salt (1/3 tsp)
Syrup
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup water
- 1/4 cup honey "optional" but not really
- 1 stick cinnamon
Instructions
- Activate the yeast by combining the water sugar yeast and a tablespoon of flour for 10 min.
- Once activated combine the rest of the ingredients, knead until smooth, and let it sit for up to 2 hours room temperature, covered, in a draft-free area.
- Using a wet tablespoon, scoop out some dough, and form into a ball in a very wet hand. Some people like using 2 spoons. Make sure to wet the spoons after each ball.
- Fry in a neutral oil, sunflower is best, canola or generic vegetable oil also work. 350F. Fry until golden brown.
- Typically drizzled or tossed in a simple syrup (1:1 sugar to water, honey is traditional), and dusted with cinnamon.
Syrup
- Add all ingredients to a pot.
- Bring to a boil, stirring occasioanlly.
- Reduce heat to med-low, and let simmer for 3-5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Set aside and allow to cool.
Notes
- Optional things - 1/2 tsp lemon zest, or some lemon extract, or 1 oz Grand Marnier work nicely in the dough.
- If you don't have honey, shame on you, but you can always add some flavour extract to the simple syrup if desired, and thicken it up a bit by letting it reduce by around 1/4 the starting volume.
- Instead of the honey syrup, you can dip the loukoumades in melted Nutella, or chocolate, or both.
- Tossing in chopped nuts, or dusting with powdered sugar, cinnamon, cocoa powder, etc. are fun options.
I might be melting some chocolate chips with a few cocoa butter wafers for drizzling or dipping and letting it cool.
Dipping these into warm Nutella is apparently all the rage out East.