Powderface Beignets

After wine-tasting on Saturday, Ms. Pssst, Ruth, and I piled in the car to check out the beignets at Powderface next to the Fruitvale BART station. As we rounded the curve, all three of us spotted the churro cart on the sidewalk and simultaneously chirped, "Churros!!!" We harbored ambitions of a Fruitvale fried dough tour, however, our beignets satisfied that craving and more.

Prices listed on the board are one order (of 3 beignets) for $2.90 or a dozen for $9.50. How could we not go for a dozen?

We watched them being made and were surprised by the generous size. The first batch was nine pieces for one round, then the remainder came later to be hot and fresh (though they went home with us). These had more air pockets and seemed a bit chewier than my long ago memory of Cafe du Monde's. The thin crust had just a bit of crispness as you bite into them.

I was happy with my iced green tea too. You can tell this was a spur-of-the-moment thing, since Pssst and I were both wearing black tees that were magnets for the powder sugar.

Link: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/30941#134395

Image: http://static.flickr.com/56/146744800...

[eatzalot]

Yes, rworange, we disagree less than you may think. "Cruller" is a stretch because it might include other shapes and is made from similar dough. Usually though, it's oblong and twisted as you say. I omitted those details, and others. (Trying to be succinct.) Just as, for instance, "liqueur" now usually means a sweetened cordial in US, but the word has been in print for many decades in a wider sense of a flavoring spirit, including rums and brandies, and you may have to read widely to learn that (unlike, apparently, the author of the prescriptive definition on Wikipedia when I last looked). A good US match for a New Orleans "beignet" is a "drop cake," recipes are basically the same. I have made them -- veyr good with maple syryp. There's another name too, less common, that I can't recall. (It all may even be online now, I don't know because I didn't get any of this there.) More people have heard of crullers I think than drop cakes. My main point in this thread remains: if you say "beignet" to a French speaker they'll understand you, but outside New Orleans they'll likely understand something different from what you mean, which is (confusingly) related. As can happen when you say (for instance) "corn" to a non-US English speaker. (That's one of those words used peculiarly in the US -- outside the US the meaning can include the US one, and other grains, so in casual sentences it looks like the same word.)

Most of my sources aren't online, they are books and writings people learned from for many years, the background information about cooking traditions. More and more is online, but for much of the written record before very recent years you may get an unrepresentative picture from a quick online search.

[eatzalot]

Thanks OldTimer. (By correct, do you mean everyone here knows this?)

Beignet trivia I omitted earlier: Standard French reference cookbooks list many beignet (fritter) recipes. Original editions of Larousse Gastronomique give about 75, Escoffier (1921) has 16, Saint-Ange (1927) 13. The version looking most like the New Orleans "beignet" is the one OldTimer mentions, called a soufflé beignet or pet de nonne and made from choux (cream-puff) pastry and (per Larousse, which has a photo) generally filled (after cooking, as with a cream puff). What Julia Child once called the nearest to a US donut is the "Vienna" beignet, from rich (brioche) dough filled with jam, custard, etc. before frying. The term is French, not Viennese. The Viennese however call an extruded churro a "syringe fritter" or Spritzkrapfen.

All these European originals are distinct from the New Orleans "beignet," which is what in the rest of the US is traditionally called a drop cake or cruller.

[rworange]

I have to disagree. A New Orleans beignet is nothing like a cruller.

http://www.answers.com/topic/cruller

I ate crullers. Crullers were my favs. A beignet is no cruller.

A French cruller is not a cruller. It only shares the name. From a Boston Globe article about Dunkin donuts discontinuing the cruller ... those donut dunkin cads ...

""A cruller is not round," Delios says flatly. "Round is a doughnut. A classic cruller is oblong and twisted."
http://www.boston.com/ae/food/article...

"Respect the cruller; tame the doughnut."
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer

[reneesf]

A few weeks ago at Shanghai Dumpling King, they came around offering orders of a fried dough dish. They were round balls, three to an order, and each about 4 inches in diameter. They were basically hollow in the center and the dough wasn’t like that of a beignet or zeppole but reminded me most of a popover. They had a little bit of granulated sugar on top. I thought they were great. They were served very hot and were not too greasy or heavy at all. I was wondering if anyone knew what they are called and if they always have them at Shanghai Dumpling King.

[ChowFun_derek]

These cruller-like confections have at least 2 names in Chinese....My favorite is "Djah Dahn" roughly translated as "Egg Bomb"

My first taste of these was at the Hong Kong Flower Lounge in Millbrae

[Gary Soup]

I think you are talking of ma qiu (麻球). They're supposedly a Shanghai specialty, but you can get very similar things at Cantonese dim sum places. They usually have sesame seeds on them, and are either topped with powdered sugar or filled with sweet bean paste. Like beignets, they are inedible once they cool down, IMHO.

[psb]

Welcome to the next level:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16827665/

[Paging Thomas Keller" ... maybe a nicotine+caffeine Beignets next?]

[eatzalot]

Everybody here knows, don't they, that New Orleans uses the word "beignet" unusually? I don't know if it was discussed here already. "Beignet" is a commonplace French food word, meaning a fritter. Most of the world understands it to mean some thing coated in batter and deep-fried. (Fruit or meat or whatever.) That's how French cookbooks use it. New Orleans evolved its own idiomatic version, a "fritter" with nothing inside. French-speaking visitors to that town have been known to be surprised at what they get when they order beignets. (Fritters have been popular around the US too at times.)

[OldTimer]

You are correct. The true French beignet is similar to a spoonful of pate a chou (chou paste) dropped into a pot of hot oil. It may be with or without filling. New Orleans French donuts are baking powder based, while many others use a yeast dough. The yeast dough is a bit chewier and contains more "bubbles". The yeast dough doughnuts can be rolled out and frozen, then thawed and fried with great success.

[Gerard]

Tried the beignets at Powderface this morning.

There are some serious kinks in their operation. It took about 15 minutes for the beignets to hit the table and there was no one in there.

That said, the wait was totally worth it. My friend and I stuck to the powdered sugar. They were made to order, accounting in part for the long wait. And just amazingly delicious. The amount of powdered sugar seemed excessive. That's an observation, not a complaint; I simply can't imagine anyone eating even half of it.

I concur with the OP's observation about the texture of the beignets. A little crispness would be an improvement. Still, these are pretty great! The coffee was decent as well.

(If you go Sunday, there's a very small farmer's market across 12th where you might pick up some convenient veg for the week. I make this observation to entice those who are reluctant to cross bridges and towns just for a beignet.)

G

[Melanie Wong]

Those fearful of bridges can always take BART. (g) The Fruitvale station is spitting distance from Powderface.

The beignets look and sound great, but back to that churro cart for a minute. Are we talking fried-to-order churros? I haven't had those in decades and would go far out of my way for one or three.

We didn't check out the churro cart, but glancing at it from across the street, it seemed to be one outfitted to fry on the spot. It also offered the filled type which I'm not crazy about but seem to be popular these days.

Link: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/...

There's also a "rogue" (nonlicensed) churro cart that's been making its appearance on the corner where I've seen them on and off over the years: the north-west corner of International and 38th. It's usually there in the late afternoon, early evening (say, 4 pm to 8 pm). Fried to order on the spot.

[Agent 510]

So where can the churro cart mentioned at the top of this thread be found?

[Melanie Wong]

The beignet place is on E. 12th St. by the BART station. The churro cart was on the other side of E. 12th St. on the sidewalk by the pedestrian walkway that connects to E. 14th.

[Melanie Wong]

Drove by the Santa Rosa churro location last week. The sign is no longer displayed and I didn't see any clues that the cart still operates here.

Emailed with a friend in New Orleans and she confirmed that Cafe du Monde is open and thriving post Katrina.

How do you promounce "beignets"?

ben yay...phonetically speaking

$2.90 is a great deal for 3 beignets; they're also surprisingly ungreasy. Did you notice that the taste and texture of the beignets slightly resembled that of the Chinese "You Tiau" or crullers? I can almost imagine the beignets crumbled into hot soy milk!

Yes, they're quite ungreasy, much less so than Chinese "oil sticks". They keep the oil in good condition. I was almost wishing for more oil/grease to make them a little more donut like. I do think the owners have a great concept making these to order.

We stuck with the powder sugar version, didn't even stray into cinnamon sugar to quell that churro urge. Have you tried any of the toppings?

Link: http://powderface.net/home.html

I tried the chocolate syrup topping once and didn't like it as well as the traditional powdered sugar.

I think it's fabulous that they make them to order; however the procedure is slow and fairly labor-intensive, so it's hard to imagine them doing any kind of volume. Their website looks like it belongs to a chain operation, so I think they have hopes of expanding, but currently, the website lists only one location.

Melanie was wishing for coffee with chickory, which is about the only non-alcoholic beverage they don't have!

Re: Powderface's capacity for volume

They did manage to serve a group of 25 or 30 hungry urban planners last spring in fairly quick order, though that was between the morning commute and any lunch crowd, and with some advance notice.

I haven't gone back since, mainly because I'd like to try losing a little weight sometime soon, and feared this might be addictive.

Good to know! I think the advance notice is key -- when we were in there in the late afternoon, they not only had to cook them, but roll them out and cut them. If they have them ready to go, it would go a little quicker.