Image: wikipedia
In the Netherlands, we traditionally eat oliebollen on NYE. Some of my favourite childhood memories of NYE are spending all day at my grandparents on December 31, and baking oliebollen with my grandma. My grandpa always got to try the first one. Oliebollen (literally: oil balls) are little balls of yeast dough that are fried in hot oil. My grandmother poured a huge stock pot full of oil and put that on the stove, I use an electric deep fryer and fry outside. For oil, I used sunflower oil.
Ingredients:
500 grams of flour (which is a little bit more than 3 3/4 cup)
500 ml of milk (a little bit less than 17 fl. oz)
1 teaspoon of dry yeast
1 egg
pinch of salt
2 tablespoons of sugar
Optionally: 250 gr of currants (1 1/4 cup) If you want to add currants: let the currants soak in water for 15-30 minutes, then drain, before you start making the batter.
One batch of batter makes 20-25 oliebollen.
Source for recipe: traditional.
Add sugar and yeast to room temperature milk and leave while you measure the other ingredients. When you’ve measured the other ingredients, add the milk-yeast-sugar mixture to the flour and salt and add the egg. This is where you add currants, if you’re using any. Mix until all the ingredients are mixed together and the batter is quite thick and a bit sticky.
Put in a not too cold spot and leave to proof until the batter has doubled in size. Yesterday, it took around 2 hours.
Heat oil to 180C (355F).
Make sure your deep fat fryer is in a safe and stable area and make sure kids and pets are at a safe distance. Dip a stainless steel ice cream scoop in the hot oil. Scoop a ball of batter, put the spoon in the oil and put the batter in the fryer. This is your first oliebol! Don’t “drop” the batter into the oil because the splatters are literally boiling oil. It’s much easier to scoop batter when the scoop is properly greased. You can fry several balls at the same time, depending on the size of your fryer. Ours is small so it only fits 3 or 4 balls at the same time.
After about 3 minutes in the oil, if you’ve shaped your ball well, it should automatically turn. If it doesn’t, turn the ball over using a slotted spoon. After 6 minutes, the ball is done. Lift the ball out of the oil using a slotted spoon and put on a plate with a couple of sheets of paper towel on them.
Serve warm with powdered sugar. They can be eaten when they’re cooled and you can also re-heat them in the oven the next day.
I used a picture from wikipedia for this topic, because I spent the whole afternoon outside frying oliebollen, while the people indoors were eating them! I fried them in the afternoon and by 10PM, this is all that was left.
For reference, there were 6 people in total and I made two batches of oliebollen, one with currants and one without, and a batch of apple beignets, fried bits of apple that are also a typical Dutch NYE treat. So we had dozens and dozens of snacks and still only two half-eaten ones saw the new year…
Side note: I’ve not tried, but I think the milk and the egg can be replaced with a vegan alternative without issues.