Bunyols de Quaresma  (Lent bunyols) are doughnuts made from a flour base, fried in oil and then coated with sugar. They are also called bunyols de vent (wind bunyols) because they have a very airy dough, as if they were empty inside.

They are usually eaten during Lent and Holy Week Before you would find them in cake shops on Wednesday and Friday around that time but now you can find them any day. In fact, as they are very easy to make, they have always been home-made cakes in the main.

There are more Lent bunyol recipes and one of the most widespread is the Empordà one, which has a more consistent dough spiced with aniseed and coriander.

Method

Ingredients: a cup of oil, a cup of water, flour, honey and oil.

Put a cup of oil in a jar with boiling water and stir.
Leave it to cool and then add the flour, stirring all the time with your hand until you have a dough you can work with.
Make very thin rings with the dough and fry them in plenty of hot oil.
Remove the bunyols from the oil and sprinkle them with honey.

Empordà variety

Ingredients: 1 kg flour, 7 eggs, 25 g baker's yeast, 300 g sugar, 30 g aniseed, 30 g coriander, 10 g salt, grated rind of 3 lemons, 10 cl anisette, 5 cl milk, a pinch of salt, oil.

Dissolve the yeast in warm milk. Put the flour on a pastry board, forming a heap with a well, and gradually add all the ingredients except the oil and 50 g of sugar. Knead it for a good while until the dough is smooth and elastic, so it doesn't break when stretched. Make it into a ball, put it in a bowl, cover it with a cloth and leave it to rise in a warm place for two hours, until it has doubled in bulk. Take pieces of the dough and, with your fingers coated with oil, give them a round shape, make a hole in the middle and gradually fry them in very hot oil. When they are golden on one side, turn them over. Drain the bunyols and sprinkle them with sugar.