Golden Koeksister with Syrup Recipe by South African Master Chef

If you have a sweet tooth and enjoy desserts, then you will love koeksisters. Like we mentioned in our Top 10 Traditional South African Meals article, there are 2 different types of koeksisters that have become extremely popular in our country. The first type is the standard koeksister, and the second is a version by the Cape Malay community. For this tutorial, we will be making the standard koeksister.

 

Side Note:

Unfortunately, this is that one dessert you cannot have with Musi Foods Atchar, or actually, is it?

Ingredients:

You do not need to make the syrup but trust me, it is a bonus, and that is why we have added it to the recipe. 

For the syrup:

250ml water

625ml sugar (white)

12 ½ ml lemon juice

5ml vanilla essence

 

For the dough:

4 x 250ml (500g) cake flour

25ml baking powder

20ml margarine

1/2 large beaten egg

245ml water

Sunflower oil

Method:

For those with the extra sweet tooth, let get syrup started:

Step 1. Mix water and sugar in a pot and allow the pot to boil.

Step 2. Stir the pot until the sugar is completely dissolved

Step 3. Take the pot off the stove and add the vanilla essence and lemon juice to the put and leave the pot in the fridge.

The syrup should be ready after 15 minutes.

Now for the dough:

Step 1. Sift the banking powder and flour together and mix in margarine with your fingertips

Step 2. Beat ½ an egg, mix with water and whisk the mixture together

Step 3. In the centre of the flour, make a hole (well) and pour the water mixture and stir until a delicate dough has formed.

Step 4. Cover the dough with clingfilm and allow it to rest for 30 minutes or up to 4 hours (the longer, the better)

Step 5. Add your oil to a pot and heat it to 160 - 170 degrees celsius.

Step 6. Sprinkle oil to a flat surface as well as your rolling pin and roll out your dough. Once rolled out, cut the dough into rectangles and plait it into strips which look like the koeksisters in the above image. Be sure to press the ends together firmly before proceeding to the next step.

Step 7. Add the plaited dough into the pot with heated oil and allow the dough to cook until it turns golden brown (this should take about 7 minutes). Do this until all the dough pieces are cooked.

Step 8. (optional). Using paper towels, drain the excess oil in the koeksisters and immediately dip them into your syrup mixture

 Conclusion 

The time has come for you to enjoy your koeksisters, boil some tea, sit back and relax while you let us know how you found our mouth-watering koeksister recipe!