Green Tea Beignets

“Green tea beignets,” my sister said as she shoved her iPhone screen in my face. It is one of Dominique Ansel’s creations in his newest café and she is already making plans in our family group chat to go pay a visit. Even though NYC is just across the bridge, it isn’t simple to make plans and go on a moment’s notice. After all, we all work and have personal obligations. But dang, ever since she said it, I could not get it out of my head. The thought would not stop haunting me, and before I knew it I was googling recipes for beignets and looking up photos of green tea beignets.
Turns out, it was simpler than I thought (which in hindsight, is not necessarily a good thing because it means that I can make beignets on a whim). The dough does not need a mixer or kneading, and it doesn’t even require a second rise! It puffs up beautifully with a honeycombed interior and is just barely sweet. This leaves you with the option to give it a generous shower of powdered sugar.
My matcha is not the highest grade because I didn’t think I would ever need a high quality powder. (In case you didn’t know, matcha can get quite pricey by the ounce.) But for this recipe, I think it is necessary. My green tea powdered sugar does not have the vibrant green that would make it scream, “Hey, I’m green tea flavored!” Instead, it whispers, “I might be something different from regular ol’ powdered sugar, you’re going to have to taste me to see…” This is not the message I wanted to send, but then again you get what you pay for and it is a lesson learned.
Either way, how wrong can you go with fried dough and sugar? The only thing is, you need to eat them within about 4 hours (and that’s with using a low heated oven to keep them warm). Past that, the dough starts to get very stale and loses its magical deliciousness.

Green Tea Beginets

Ingredients:

1 c. water, 110˚F and not from tap
3 tbsp. sugar, divided
1 ½ tbsp. active dry yeast
3 c. all-purpose flour
¾ tsp. kosher salt
2 large eggs
2 tbsp. vegetable oil
vegetable oil for frying
green tea powdered sugar (recipe below)

Instructions:

1. Combine water, 1 tbsp. sugar, and yeast in a bowl until foamy.
2. In a large bowl, combine flour, salt, eggs, and 2 tbsp. vegetable oil until combined. Add the water mixture and stir until a smooth, sticky dough forms.
3. Spray another bowl with nonstick spray and transfer dough. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for the dough to rise and double in size, about 1-2 hours.
4. On a large surface, generously coated with flour, dump out cold dough and roll out to a rectangle that is ¼ in. thick. Cut into 24 squares with a well lubed pizza cutter.
5. On two baking sheets, set each sheet with a wire cooling rack.
6. Heat oil in a Dutch oven until 350˚F, fry dough 5 at a time until golden brown on both sides, about 3 minutes. Keep oil temperature between 325˚F – 350˚F. Transfer fried dough onto wire cooling rack
7. If you want to wait until all of the dough is fried, keep it warm in a 175˚F -200˚F oven.
8. Dust generously with green tea powdered sugar and serve.

Green Tea Powdered Sugar

Ingredients:

3 tbsp. matcha (green tea) powder
1 ½ c. powdered sugar

Instructions:

1. Sift matcha powder and powdered together with a mesh strainer and mix until homogenous.