Sourdough Awamat!

Awamat are lightly sweetened Lebanese donuts, except I spiced them with saffron as is done in some Gulf nations. I also dipped them in scented, warmed honey instead of the more standard sugar syrup because I like honey better. If you prefer the more traditional syrup, you’ll just make a sugar syrup instead of warming honey!

Normally, you see really different donuts than this during Chanukah, but this is what I wanted instead. I’m not huge on sufganiyot, honestly. I really want to like them, but they’re just far too sweet for me. This splits the difference between Child Tester’s need for sweet-sweet donuts, and my need to not feel so much sugar in my mouth!

This batch yielded around 2 dozen donuts. I made a small batch because there are only 3 of us, but you can maintain the ratios and scale it up to fit the needs of a larger family or gathering.

Here’s what you’ll need

Dough

1 1/4 cups flour, plus a lot extra for your hands

1 cup active, 100% hydration sourdough starter (I used Alaska; y’all use what you like)

6 ounces water

1/4 teaspoon saffron or cardamom, ground (optional)

pinch of salt

1 teaspoon sugar (I used vanilla; you use what you like)

olive oil for frying

Syrup

1 cup honey (or 1 cup simple syrup)

1/2 teaspoon rose or orange blossom water (optional); I used orange blossom because CT said she wasn’t feeling rose that day

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Here’s what you’ll do

NOTE: if you are using the saffron, you’ll want to boil the 6 ounces of water and pour it over your saffron about 4 hours before you make your dough. You can short this (as I did, since I forgot) and do 1-2 hours. You won’t get the same vibrancy in the color, but you do still get most of the flavor.

That water, of course, should be cooled enough to not destroy your yeast from the starter. There is no need to take this step if you’re using cardamom or no spice, but it is important for the saffron to be properly bloomed. Or at least partially bloomed. Do what you can.

Mix your dry ingredients. Child Tester was pretty stoked to make donuts with me, so she did most of the early part. She also ground the saffron. I get in trouble if I grind the saffron instead of “letting” her, as this is her very favorite spice. She considers saffron candy to be the best candy available!

Add the wet ingredients, not including your sourdough. That yellow is from the saffron. It’d be even more vibrant if I’d bloomed it properly!

Time for your SD starter! She switched to a spatula for more ease in folding. You’re basically folding at this point.

It’ll look like this when it’s all mixed in. Or thereabout. Yes, you’re really going to make donuts out of this mess! But you’ve got to knead it first. Sort of.

I personally recommend you use a spatula to knead your dough, because really you’re folding it for about 5-10 minutes. Figure 7. Either way, it will be elastic and not hugely dissimilar in its texture from viili when you’re done. It will be extremely sticky still, and you will feel a bit uncertain as to whether I lied to you. I promise I didn’t. Either way, I was abandoned at this stage because this part of the job really isn’t the most fun portion.

Here’s an excellent video from a lady who makes these the potato way (equally valid, equally delicious) so you can see what I mean. This may legitimately be challenging for people to understand without seeing it in action. I plan to try her method next time I make them!

She also does the very cool pinch method, which I admit I do not. Either way, let your dough rest at least an hour to rise, but ideally 4 since sourdough.

Once they’ve rested and you’ve heated up your oil, you can start dropping small amounts of dough balls in there. Don’t overcrowd your pan, though you could put more in at a time than I did. Also, please use more than I did, because these really should float like dumplings when they’re done, and they won’t do this right if the oil isn’t deep enough).

Your oil should be around 375F. If you didn’t want to dirty your thermometer (me!) or don’t have one, stick the handle of a wooden spoon in the oil. If it’s hot enough, it’ll bubble around the oil. If it doesn’t do that, not hot enough.

Here is where you need to flour. Coat your hands liberally in flour and pinch some of the dough off in whatever manner you prefer, then do your best to roll it. I like to have flour on the outside and shape it like a tiny boule. Drop them in the fryer.

You shouldn’t do this, either. This is happening because I noticed mine were not cooked all the way through when I went to dip them in the honey syrup, so I put them all back in together. If you’re not “re-frying,” don’t crowd the pot.

Set up your dipping station! All your finished, golden awamat on one end, honey/sugar syrup in the middle for dipping, fork to easily remove and let drain, plate for the finisheds. I have tried a lot of different ways to do this in avoidance of this style of organization, and I strongly recommend being organized in some fashion similar to this pic. Strongly recommend. Sweet things are a nightmare to clean off counters!

To make your syrup: warm your honey until it’s kind of runny. Ideally you won’t be lazy like me and you’ll use the stove instead of the microwave. Or you can be like me and nuke the honey. Only you will know, unless you tell someone! Once the honey is runny, whisk or stir in your lemon juice and the scented water, if you’re using that too. Either way, the honey really does need to be warmed so that it’s more like syrup. It will not coat your donuts correctly if you don’t warm it first. Trust me on that. If you’re going sugar syrup, yours is default runny so you’ve got nothing to worry about.

These are basically how they should look if you are looking just for the syrup that soaked in while you were dipping.

This is what the crumb looks like if you didn’t feel you had enough syrup and dunked it in more once you’d had a bite.

This one cracks me up. Happy holidays, y’all!