Churros and Australian Gourmet Traveller

My sister recently came back from America and now shares my love for churros; those hot beautiful crunchy yet soft cinnamon donuts that I discovered on my trip a few years back. 

There's something fascinating about cooking for us Gen Y kids.  While we have a million choices of places to buy from it seems much more satisfying (and often therapeutic) to make it ourselves... no matter how hard it is to do and how time consuming it might be!

For anyone who is keen on the recipe - i have included it below from this month's Gourmet Traveller.  I am hoping for a subscription to this magazine for Christmas from Santa.  Fingers crossed.

Churros
Serves 6
Cooking Time Prep time 15 mins, cook 15 mins (plus resting)

325 gm plain flour
60 ml (¼ cup) olive oil
For deep-frying: vegetable oil
For dusting: caster sugar

1. Sift flour and a pinch of salt into a heatproof bowl.
2. Combine oil and 450ml water in a saucepan and bring to the boil over medium-high heat. Pour over flour and beat quickly with a wooden spoon to combine.
3. Transfer mixture to an electric mixer fitted with a paddle and beat until a very smooth dough forms (2-3 minutes).
4. Transfer dough to a piping bag fitted with a 2cm star nozzle and push down to remove any air bubbles in bag. Refrigerate to rest and chill (30 minutes). 
5. Heat oil in a deep-fryer or deep-sided frying pan to 180C. Pipe long lengths of mixture (about 15-20cm) into hot oil, creating a swirl, and cut with scissors. Be careful as oil is hot and may spit.
6. Fry churros in batches, turning occasionally with a spider, until golden (3-5 minutes), then remove with a spider and drain on absorbent paper. Toss in a bowl with caster sugar, shaking off excess, and serve immediately.

Once you have made the churros it's time to make the chocolate dipping sauce:

200 ml each heavy (45% milk fat) and pouring cream
½ tsp vanilla extract
1 cinnamon quill
150 gm dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids), finely chopped
60 ml Pedro Ximénez  (a sweet dark sherry - i'll be leaving this out)
1 tsp finely grated orange rind

Bring cream, vanilla and cinnamon just to the boil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add chocolate, Pedro Ximénez and orange rind and stir over low heat until smooth (2-4 minutes). Serve hot with warm churros.

This recipe is from the October 2009 issue of Australian Gourmet Traveller.