Tolumbichki

Ingredients

The syrup

• 500 gsugar
• 300 mlwater
• juice of 1 lemon
• a strip of lemon peel
• 1 teaspoonvanilla
• optional
• made first, and chilled

The batter

• 250 mlwater
• 60 mlsunflower oil
• or 60 g butter
• 1 tablespoonsugar
• half a teaspoon salt
• 150 gplain flour
• 3eggs, at room temperature
• beaten lightly
• 1 tablespooncornflour
• optional, for crispness

For frying

• 1 litreneutral oil
• or enough for 6 cm depth
• sunflower or rapeseed

Equipment

• a piping bag
• a large star nozzle
• a heavy deep pan
• a cooking thermometer
• scissors, to cut the batter
• a slotted spoon

To serve

• cold, in a bowl
• with strong coffee
• or with tea

Directions

1. Put the sugar and water in a heavy pan. Add the strip of lemon peel to the pan. Heat it gently and stir until the sugar dissolves. Do not let it boil before it dissolves. Boil it for about eight to ten minutes. It should thicken slightly but stay pourable. Add the lemon juice at the end of boiling. The acid stops it crystallising later.
2. Add the vanilla if you are using it. Take it off the heat and let it cool. There is a safety point about sugar syrup. Cool it for a full twenty minutes and get advice. Keep children well away from the pan. Put the water, oil, sugar and salt in a pan.
3. Bring it to a full rolling boil. Take it off the heat immediately. Tip in all of the flour at once. Beat it hard with a wooden spoon. Return the pan to a low heat again. Beat it for two or three minutes more. The dough should pull away from the pan sides. Tip the dough into a large bowl. Let it cool for about ten minutes. It should be warm but not hot to touch.
4. Beat well after each addition. Keep beating until it is smooth again. You may well not need all the egg. Add the cornflour now if you are using it. Fill the bag with the warm dough. Fill it no more than one third full. Never leave hot oil unattended at all.
5. Keep a well fitting lid within reach. If it catches fire, turn off the heat. Start at about one hundred and forty degrees. Cut each one off with scissors. Make them about five centimetres long.
6. Bring it up to about one hundred and seventy. Dropped into hot oil they brown outside instantly. Fry them for eight to ten minutes in total. They should be deep golden and hard-crisp. Turn them as they fry so they colour evenly. Lift them out with a slotted spoon. Now drop them straight into the cold syrup.
7. Leave them in the syrup for two minutes. Lift them out with a slotted spoon. Put them on a rack or a serving dish. Continue with the remaining batter. Let the oil return to the cool starting temperature. Let them cool completely before eating. They are served cold, never warm. Serve them in a bowl with a little syrup. They keep two days at room temperature.

Technique

• Cold syrup, hot pastry. That temperature difference is the whole technique — the crisp shell stays crisp while the inside soaks. Hot syrup on hot pastry gives something soggy throughout; cold on cold does not soak at all. Make the syrup first and chill it properly.
• Start the frying in cool oil, around 140 degrees, and raise the heat gradually. This is unusual and it matters: it lets the pastries expand fully and cook through. Dropped into hot oil they brown outside while the inside stays raw, and they can burst open and throw hot oil.
• Fry them until deep golden and genuinely hard-crisp. Pale ones collapse the moment they meet the syrup.
• Two minutes in the syrup and no longer. Left in, they turn soggy right through.
• Let the cooked dough cool to warm before the eggs go in. Hot dough scrambles them, which is the most common mistake in any choux-type batter.
• A star nozzle is not decorative. The ridges add surface area for crispness and hold syrup in their grooves; a plain nozzle gives a different pastry.
• Boiling sugar syrup burns worse than boiling water because it is hotter and it sticks. Never taste it from the pan or lean over it. Cool a splash under running water for a full twenty minutes.
• The sweet is Ottoman in origin — tulumba in Turkish — and near-identical versions are made from Greece and the Balkans through to Iran and Egypt. Empires spread sweets, the empires ended, and the sweets stayed and became local. The atlas records the family and adjudicates no origin claim.

Substitutions

• Butter replaces oil in the batter for a richer pastry, though oil keeps it dairy-free for fasting periods.
• Orange juice and peel replace lemon in the syrup for a different, rounder flavour.
• A little honey stirred into the cooled syrup adds depth, though it is not traditional.
• Cornflour is optional; it gives a slightly crisper shell.
• Any neutral high-smoke-point oil suits the frying; sunflower is standard in Bulgaria.
• Rosewater or a strip of orange peel in the syrup points the sweet towards its Middle Eastern relatives.

Variations

• Turkish tulumba is the direct ancestor, usually made slightly larger.
• Iranian bamieh is a close relative, often shaped shorter and rounder, and is particularly associated with Ramadan.
• Balah el sham in Egypt and the Levant is essentially the same pastry under another name.
• Greek loukoumades are the round fried dough relative, soaked in honey syrup rather than lemon syrup.
• Some Bulgarian bakeries dust them with ground walnuts or cinnamon after syruping.
• A version made with a little yoghurt in the batter is softer and is made in some households.

History

Ottoman-derived sweet sold by weight in Bulgarian bakeries and made at home in Lent.

Frequently asked questions

What is Tolumbichki?

Tolumbichki is a dessert from Bulgaria: small fried batter fingers steeped in cold lemon syrup. Ottoman-derived sweet sold by weight in Bulgarian bakeries and made at home in Lent.

How long does Tolumbichki take to make?

Tolumbichki takes 30 minutes of preparation and 30 minutes, plus cooling of cooking. The recipe makes makes about 30. It is rated medium to make.

What can I substitute in Tolumbichki?

Yes, within limits. Butter replaces oil in the batter for a richer pastry, though oil keeps it dairy-free for fasting periods. Orange juice and peel replace lemon in the syrup for a different, rounder flavour. A little honey stirred into the cooled syrup adds depth, though it is not traditional. Cornflour is optional; it gives a slightly crisper shell. Any neutral high-smoke-point oil suits the frying; sunflower is standard in Bulgaria. Rosewater or a strip of orange peel in the syrup points the sweet towards its Middle Eastern relatives.

What is the most important thing to get right in Tolumbichki?

Put the sugar and water in a heavy pan. Add the strip of lemon peel to the pan. Heat it gently and stir until the sugar dissolves. Do not let it boil before it dissolves. Boil it for about eight to ten minutes. It should thicken slightly but stay pourable. Add the lemon juice at the end of boiling. The acid stops it crystallising later.