🍩 Sfenj (Moroccan Doughnuts)
Sfenj are rings of soft yeasted dough fried in hot oil until puffed and golden. The outside turns crisp while the inside stays airy and chewy. They are eaten fresh, often sprinkled with sugar, with a glass of mint tea for breakfast or an afternoon snack, and are sold from street stalls threaded on palm fronds.
Diets
Allergens
Contains (in a typical recipe):
What it is made of
Recipe
Ingredients
- 500 g flour
- 7 g dried yeast
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1 tsp salt
- 400 ml warm water
- Oil for deep-frying
- 2 tbsp sugar for sprinkling
Method
- Mix flour, yeast, sugar and salt, then beat in the water to a sticky dough.
- Cover and leave to rise for 1–1.5 hours until doubled.
- Heat oil to about 180 °C.
- With wet hands pull off a piece of dough, poke a hole through it, stretch into a ring and slip into the oil.
- Fry 2–3 minutes, turning, until golden. Drain and sprinkle with sugar.
How to make it lighter
- Keep the oil at a steady 180 °C so the dough absorbs less fat.
- Drain on a rack or paper towels and skip the sugar coating.
- Have one sfenj rather than several; 1 tbsp sugar is about 50 kcal.
History
Sfenj are a long-standing street food across Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia, where specialist fryers known as sfanjiya shape them by hand. They are still made fresh each morning in North African towns and cities.
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Values are estimates per 100 g for a typical recipe; home and restaurant versions vary. Diets and allergens are worked out from the ingredients of a typical recipe — always check with whoever cooked the dish. Not medical advice. Nutrition data: Me Nutrition dish database v13. How we count →