Auszogne, Kirchweihnudeln, Knienudeln, Kreppel or “tortas fritas”

This is a quick but delicious recipe I've inherited from my German ancestors. It's known by several names; some of them are “tortas fritas” in the Río de la Plata region, “sopaipillas” in Chile and Peru, and Auszogne, Kirchweihnudeln, Knienudeln or Kreppel in some regions of Germany and Austria.

The final result is a soft bakery that can be eaten with coffee, tea, mate cocido or hot chocolate.

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You will need the following ingredients:

• 500 g flour.
• 30 g yeast.
• 250 ml milk.
• 60 g butter; if you don't have it, you can replace it with refined fat.
• 60 g sugar.
• 2 eggs.
• ~ 1/2 kg of cooking or refined fat.
• A pinch of salt.

Optionally:

• Lemon zest.
• Cinnamon.
• Powdered sugar.

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In a cup, put the yeast, a teaspoon of sugar and another teaspoon of flour, and lukewarm water. Mix it thoroughly, and let it activate.

Meanwhile, mix the flour, the eggs, the milk and the butter (or fat) with the salt and the lemon zest using a bowl. Sift the flour if neccesary. When the yoast is activated (it does some bubbles), add it to the flour and the rest of the ingredients, and mix. Keep adding flour slowly, until it doesn't stick on your hands anymore.

Now, put the dough in a countertop sprinkled with flour, and knead it for about five minutes. Once the dough is soft and doesn't stick to the surface, cut it in small chunks, grab a rolling pin and roll each one of those chunks to get a rounded, flat dough. You can cut the borders if they are irregular.

Carefully, pull out the dough pieces in the middle without creating a hole, and leaving a 2 cm wide edge on the outside. It should be thin in the center and thicker in the borders.

For the baking process, put the cooking fat in a pan and wait until it's hot. Now, carefully, put each one of the “Knienudeln” pieces inside; ideally, one each time. If the fat is hot enough, it should cook each side in less than 20 seconds. Use a spatula or a slotted spoon to extract each piece, and put them on a strainer.

You can sprinkle them with powdered sugar and/or cinnamon if you want to; just do it quickly after extracting them, to allow the sugar to adhere.

bon appetit