Sicilian sfinci or St. Martin’s sfinci are extremely soft and delicious fritters prepared both for St. Martin’s Day and during the Carnival period. Like every traditional recipe, there are different versions, and today I’m presenting the one with very soft potatoes, which is simple to prepare. Let’s see together how to prepare them in the following recipe.
- Difficulty: Easy
- Cost: Cheap
- Rest time: 2 Hours
- Preparation time: 15 Minutes
- Cooking time: 30 Minutes
- Portions: 40
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: Carnival
Ingredients
- 12.3 oz boiled potatoes
- 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 egg
- 1.8 oz sugar
- 1 1/2 cups milk
- 0.4 oz fresh yeast
- 1 packet vanillin
- 1 orange zest
- 1 lemon zest
- as needed sunflower oil (for frying)
- as needed granulated sugar (for decoration)
Tools
- 1 Deep fryer
Steps
Start preparing the Sicilian sfinci by pouring the yeast and sugar into a container with the milk, stir, and let them dissolve. Then pour the flour into a large bowl with the grated lemon and orange zest, mashed potatoes, the egg, and finally the milk with the dissolved yeast and sugar.
Using a fork, start mixing until you get a fairly sticky and stringy dough. Now cover with a cloth and let it rest for about 3 hours.
After these hours, your dough should have risen to at least double, so prepare your deep fryer by pouring oil into it. My deep fryer broke just this morning, so I did as my grandmother used to do, I took a large pot and poured in about 4 cups of oil and heated it until I did the toothpick test. At this point, take half a tablespoon of dough and with the help of a second spoon, drop the dough into the hot oil. Turn the Sicilian sfinci occasionally until they are nicely golden. Then place them on parchment paper and let them cool well. After frying all the sfinci, roll them in sugar and serve. They are fabulous.
Saby recommends…
In many areas of Sicily, instead of orange and lemon zest, it is customary to add liqueur to flavor the dough.
