Ingredients:
Dough
• 2 cups cake flour
• 2 tablespoon baking powder
• ½ tsp salt
• 1 large egg
• 4 tbsp butter/margarine
• ½ cup of water
• oil for frying
Syrup
• 1kg sugar
• 1 ½ cinnamon sticks
• ½ teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 ½ cups of water
• Juice of one lemon
Method:
Dough
• Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together.
• Rub in the butter and mix until pliable.
• Mix this with the egg and water (adding the water a little at a time).
• Work the dough well. If the dough appears to be lumpy and sticky, continue to work the dough until it will ball up.
• Let the dough rest at room temperature for about three hours (under an inverted mixing bowl).
Syrup
• Prepare the syrup a day before (it needs to be very cold).
• Dissolve sugar in the water.
• Add the spices and lemon juice to this and boil together. Leave the syrup cool in the fridge overnight.
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).
• Plat 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 (which should have been kept in the fridge until needed).
• 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 keeping the syrup bowl in another container filled with iced water.
