Gogoși are Moldovan and Romanian yeast doughnuts. They are fluffy circles of dough fried in oil and sprinkled with sugar, golden outside, airy inside, with a characteristic pale band round the middle. They are fried at family celebrations, at fairs and simply at weekends, and the smell filling the kitchen is something people remember from childhood.
The dough for gogoși
The dough is soft and rich, made with milk, eggs and butter. First a sponge is set from warm milk, yeast, a spoon of sugar and a little flour. When foam appears, the yeast is alive and you can make the dough.
Warm the milk until it feels warm to a finger, since hot milk kills the yeast. Take the eggs out in advance. Add the flour gradually: the dough should stay soft and slightly sticky. The more flour, the denser the gogoși.
How to knead
Work in the butter when the base has already come together and knead for about ten minutes. At first the dough sticks, then it turns smooth and glossy and pulls away from the sides. You can grease your hands with a drop of oil, but do not add a lot of flour.
Soft dough gives airy gogoși, stiff dough gives heavy ones. If you knead in a mixer with a dough hook, six or seven minutes is enough.
Flour for the dough: you can compare prices in the catalogues:
In the catalogues now: flour
MACINATORUL Făină de grâu calitate superioară 2Kg8.49 lei/kg16.99 lei
ZERNARI Făină de grâu 1kg9.45 lei/kg9.45 lei
Kudesnita Făină de orez 500 g69.9 lei/kg34.95 lei
Vreau din România Făină de cozonac tip 000 1 kg1 kg7.95 lei
Făină de grâu 5 kg5 kg39.90 leiUntil 28 OctProving and shaping
Cover the dough and leave it in a warm place for an hour. It should double. Turn it onto a floured table, do not knead it and do not push all the air out. Roll it into a sheet about a centimetre and a half thick.
Cut circles seven centimetres wide with a glass. You can make a hole in the middle to get ring doughnuts. Gather the scraps, knead them briefly and roll again, but those gogoși will be a little denser.
The second rise
Lay the circles on a floured board, cover with a towel and leave for twenty-five minutes. They become noticeably puffier. This is an important stage: if you skip it, the gogoși come out dense.
Do not leave them too long: dough that has over-proved collapses when turned. Ready pieces feel soft as a pillow, and a dent from a finger slowly springs back.
Frying
In a deep pot heat sunflower oil to a layer five or six centimetres deep. The temperature is about 170 degrees: a scrap of dough thrown in floats and turns golden in about a minute. If the oil smokes, it is too hot.
Lower the gogoși in two or three at a time, no more: otherwise the temperature drops. Fry the first side under a lid for two or three minutes, which is how the pale band forms around the doughnut. Turn and fry without the lid for two more minutes until golden. Lift out with a slotted spoon onto a paper towel.
Compare the price of frying oil here:
In the catalogues now: sunflower oil
Regal Ulei de floarea-soarelui Rafin. 5l36.72 lei/l183.60 lei
Regal Ulei de floarea-soarelui Rafin. 0.95l37.42 lei/l35.55 leiSugar and fillings
Roll warm gogoși in sugar or dust them with icing sugar. Cold ones hold sugar badly. In Moldova they are loved plain and sweet, with tea or milk. You can serve them with jam or with sour cream and sugar.
You can fill them with jam or plum butter: make a cut on the side and pipe the filling in with a piping bag. Another way: put a spoon of filling between two circles and pinch the edges. A cottage cheese filling is made as for plăcinte with cheese, only sweeter.
If something goes wrong
Heavy, greasy gogoși are a sign of cold oil or too big a batch. A raw middle is a sign of hot oil or thick dough. If the gogoși do not puff up, the yeast was dead or the dough was not given time to rise. A foaming sponge is the best insurance.
If the dough is too sticky, grease your hands with oil rather than adding a lot of flour. If it is dry, add a spoon of milk.
Storing them and saving money
Gogoși are best on the day they are fried. Keep them under a towel or in a box at room temperature for up to a day. On the second day warm them in the oven for five minutes and they become almost fresh. It is better to add the sugar just before serving.
The dough can be made the evening before and put in the fridge under film: in the morning take it out, leave for half an hour and fry. For the sugar and eggs you can watch the price of sugar and eggs this week. Gogoși are filling, and a lot comes out of a small amount of ingredients.
