Jimi Famurewa’s recipe for puff-puff pancakes

2 hours ago 2

Efteling is a fairytale-themed, 73-year-old amusement park in the south of the Netherlands that, after two consecutive years of visits, has become an acute obsession among my family. We love the vaguely folk-horror animatronic trees, witches and giant sea monsters lurking within a labyrinthine real forest. We love the anthropomorphised talking bins that plead (in a haunting, perpetual sing-song) for crumpled pieces of paper to be shoved into their suction-powered mouths. We love the inventive rides that, variously, judder along rattling wooden tracks, plunge cursed pirate ships into water, or nudge gondolas serenely through sylvan scenes of bum-flashing goblins showering beneath waterfalls.

But our very favourite thing about the place might well be the poffertjes stand, a perennially busy kiosk where exhausted families gather for dinky paper boats filled with these yeast-puffed and sugar-dusted miniature buckwheat pancakes that are a Dutch institution. Made to order in a vast, uniformly indented pan, speared through their light, custardy middles with toothpicks and served with a thick swoop of pale butter, they always prompt an acute, grunting sort of shared pleasure and succour. Poffertjes (pronounced a little like “poffeh-tyuss”) are the dangled prize for the four of us; a reliable salve to the jittery overstimulation-loop that only themed leisure environments can provide. When we cajoled the blubbering eight-year-old on to a haunted house attraction that then promptly broke down (I imagine this tale will be tearfully described to a therapist one day), a shared portion of a dozen, ethereally warm poffertjes was how we chose both to apologise and collectively soothe our jangled nerves.

Flash forward to a year or so after my first encounter with poffertjes, and I was back in our south-east London kitchen, trying to contrive a way to make Nigerian puff-puff without deep-frying. This, for the uninitiated, is a quite different, almost-soundalike snack that nonetheless delivers a similarly potent hit of pleasure. West African in origin (and also known as bofrot), puff-puff are the bulbous, gratifyingly chewy Nigerian version of the yeasted drop doughnuts that many different food cultures seem to have a beloved version of. Puff-puff are peddled at Lagos roadsides, and are often whipped up to toast births and commemorate deaths. They are a spongey, sugar-glistened mainstay among the “small chop” snacks at a lavish Nigerian party; the thing my mother rarely leaves the house without the rudimentary ingredients for. Ask about the oil levels in her car and you could easily be referring to the giant bottle of Crisp ‘N Dry that has permanent residence in her boot.

Puff-puff are always deep-fried: a sticky, aerated dough that’s plopped into a generously poured, roiling pan of oil with either a wooden spoon or (if you are a proper West African matriarch) a dextrous hand. This wouldn’t do for my specific puff-puff purposes – a cooking demonstration where deep-frying wasn’t possible – so I had to think laterally. And that is when I thought of poffertjes or, rather, a hybrid version of puff-puff pancakes, too good to be eaten only at breakfast or, for that matter, in the hallucinatory wilds of a Dutch amusement park.

Puff-puff pancakes

Serves 8

4 tsp dried active yeast (about 13g)
120g granulated sugar, plus 1 tbsp extra
350ml warm water, or warm milk for a deeper flavour
380g plain flour
½ tbsp salt
¼ tsp ground cardamom
½ tsp grated nutmeg
Neutral oil, for frying
75g icing sugar
½ tsp ground cinnamon

Whisk the dried active yeast with a tablespoon of granulated sugar and the warm water, then set aside for 10 minutes, until fully bloomed and foamy.

Meanwhile, in a large bowl combine the plain flour, salt, the remaining 120g granulated sugar, ground cardamom and grated nutmeg. Make a well in the middle, pour in the foamed yeast mix and stir to make a smooth batter. Cover with a couple of clean, damp tea towels and leave at room temperature for about 45 minutes, or until the dough has doubled in size (it should be quite wet and tacky).

Put a dribble of neutral oil in a wide, nonstick frying pan on a medium-high heat, then, working in batches, fry tablespoon-sized dollops of the mixture for two to three minutes per side, until puffed into chubby, golden-brown pucks. Set aside on a large, warmed plate while you cook the rest.

Finish by mixing the icing sugar and cinnamon, then dust this mix over the top of the pancakes with a sieve. Eat as they are or with jam, curd, chocolate spread or chopped seasonal fruit.