Polish yeasted doughnuts
Also known as ponczki. These deep-fried, yeasted doughnuts and moist, slightly sweet, dotted with raisins and fragranced with orange zest. Serve as a snack or a treat.
Ingredients
Makes: 4 dozen
- 15g compressed fresh yeast
- 475ml milk
- 80g raisins, finely chopped
- 125ml warm water
- 4 egg yolks
- 1 egg
- 100g caster sugar
- 50g unsalted butter, melted
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 50g orange zest
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 750g plain flour
- 2 litres vegetable oil for frying
- icing sugar, for dusting
Method
Prep:1hr ›
Cook:10min ›
Extra time:4hr proofing ›
Ready in:5hr10min
- Warm the milk in a small saucepan until it bubbles, then remove from heat and let cool until lukewarm. In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in lukewarm, scalded milk. Add 250g flour. Stir well and allow to rest 1 hour in a warm place.
- Soften chopped raisins in warm water for 30 minutes.
- Beat egg, egg yolks, sugar, vanilla, melted butter, salt and orange zest. Add to yeast mixture. Stir in raisins. Stir in egg mixture. Blend well. Add 500g flour. Mix well, forming smooth ball. Dough will be somewhat soft, but not "batter-like." Cover dough and allow to rise until fully doubled. Punch down, let rise until double again.
- Roll dough into 1.25cm balls, set aside to rise until doubled in bulk. In a deep fat fryer, heat oil to 190 degrees C.
- Drop 2 or 3 at a time into hot fat, turn when deep golden brown. If removed too soon, dough will be uncooked inside. When done drain briefly and dust with icing sugar before serving.
Tip
Compressed fresh yeast can be purchased at bakeries that make their own breads from scratch. If this is unavailable, use a 7g sachet of dried active yeast.
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Reviews & ratings
Average global rating:
(7)
Reviews in English (3)
Hi! I'm Polish and this is really spelled "paczki," which means "little packages" in Polish. The way you have it spelled is kind of the way it's pronounced. It's great to see your recipe up here. It's different from mine. You use raisins, which is more common in "babka." Glad you're carrying on the tradition! Thanks. - 22 Jun 2008 (Review from Allrecipes US | Canada)
I also know these as "paczki", not "ponczki". I also know that they are usually filled with a prune filling (traditionally) and they don't usually have raisins directly in the dough. So instead of raisins, I chopped up prunes and added them to the dough; and I also filled some of them with a prune filling I made--a kind of compromise lol. I also used rapid rise yeast instead of a compressed yeast cake (it is difficult for me to find that here). I made the yeast sponge by warming the milk with a little bit of sugar in the microwave until it was warm to the touch. Added in the yeast and flour and let it sit for a bit. Then I creamed together the egg yolks, egg, and sugar in a separate bowl until pale yellow and the sugar had dissolved. Then I mixed in the melted butter, vanilla, orange zest, salt, and prunes to the egg mixture. Also 1/2 cup of orange zest would be way too much--only use a tablespoon or two at most. Then added in the yeast sponge, and the rest of the flour, and followed through with the rising of the dough. It is a sticky dough, but you should still be able to form it into a ball. I also patted the dough out to about 1/2" thick, and cut out rounds using a 3 inch round cookie cutter before frying. Make sure that your paczki's are no more than a 1/2" thick or they will not cook all the way in the center (I had that issue with a few). I also baked a few in the oven at 350 for about 25-30 minutes, and they are ridiculously flaky! Overall, very good doughnuts! Thank - 27 Jan 2018 (Review from Allrecipes US | Canada)
II enjoyed it very much but I'm not such a sugar tooth and it tasted a little of but overall amazing, my kids loved it. - 20 Dec 2017 (Review from Allrecipes US | Canada)