Happy Mardi Gras!!! My Ode to Blueberry Beignets

Happy Fat Tuesday!  In honor of Mardi Gras, we decided to make beignets. Here's the funny thing, though, I have never had a beignet, but I've seen pictures, and I do know that they are a specialty in New Orleans, and that they are yummy donut-like bits of fried pastry, sprinkled with powdered sugar.  They seem like they'd be delicious!

My mom, being overly ambitious, selected a special recipe for blueberry beignets, but when the time came(yesterday after school, and violin practice), we found that it was getting late, and just thinking about making a dough, waiting for it to rise, and then frying it, was a little much.

So, we decided to make a Beignet look-alike.  We did this with an Ebelskiver pan.  Ebelskivers are little round filled pancakes made in a special pan.  They are puffy rounds bits of joy!  The best part is, they are pretty quick to make, too.  We adapted a recipe from the cookbook Ebelskivers, by Kevin Crafts, which we had in the pantry with our pan.  We bought the pan about a year ago, and love it! If you don't have the pan, or the vanilla bean paste, don't worry, you can order one from Williams Sonoma, through the link on the right side of my blog.

Beignet Doppelganger Batter

Once my mom had made her changes to the original Vanilla batter, by adding fresh blueberries, brown sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla bean paste, we had a whole new recipe: Brown Sugar Blueberry Beignet Doppelgangers!

Ebelskiver Pan



Flipping the Beignets



Golden Puffs

Mom's note: here's our recipe adaptation. This recipe makes about 20 yummy treats.  Enjoy!

Brown Sugar Blueberry Beignet Doppelgangers

1 Cup All- Purpose Flour
1 1/2 teaspoons brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs, separated
1 cup milk
2 Tbs melted butter
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla bean paste
1/2 cup fresh organic blueberries

powdered sugar for dusting

In large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.  In a small bowl, lightly whisk the egg yolks, then add the milk, melted butter, and vanilla paste.  Add the yolk mixture to the flour mixture, and blend with wooden spoon.  Batter will be lumpy.

In a clean bowl, beat the egg whites with an electric mixer until still, but not dry, peaks form  Fold the egg whites into the batter.  Then fold the blueberries into the batter.

Heat the ebelskiver pan, to medium/high, brush the pancake wells with melted butter, then fill almost to the top with batter.  Keep an eye on them, and gently turn them,  when bottom half is golden.  When they are done, dust with powdered sugar.  Enjoy!!!



Dusting with Powdered Sugar



Getting Ready for Mardi Gras!

Happy Fat Tuesday!!