the other day i received one of the sweetest emails ever. and from a stranger no less.  elizabeth, a fellow dominican gal, asked me whether or not i knew how to make yaniqueques which are what we call johnnycakes in the dominican rep.  she commented how it is sometimes tough to get recipes from our moms/aunts/grandmas because they usually say things like “un chin de” (“a little bit of”) or “hasta que este” (“until it is done”). those are their measurements. it is always funny when i am on the phone with mom and she just says… “oh you know, cook it until it is done”… and if i say anything about how would i know it is done, she just says “you’ve seen me cook before. you know!”. hahahaha!!

so, back to to the yaniqueques. they are basically fried dough.  in the dominican republic they are traditionally eaten with hot chocolate or salami. for some reason, i always associate rainy mornings with yaniqueques.  it is probably because my mom tried to get me to drink some hot cocoa to warm us up (shut up! i swear it gets cold in dr… like 70 degrees) and we apparently demanded yaniqueques anytime there was hot cocoa around.  to keep up with tradition, the day i made these was raining as well. dominican yaniqueques/yanikekes/johnnycakes!

INGREDIENTS:
2 cups of all purpose flour
1 tablespoon butter
1 teaspoon of baking soda
about 1 cup of salted water
2 cups of vegetable or canola oil

INSTRUCTIONS:
start by sifting together the flour and baking powder.

add the butter and mix with your hands.

i know it seems as if you need more butter but trust me, that is just enough.

mix well about a cup of warm water and about 1 tablespoon of salt. use less if you are using salted butter.

mix the flour/butter/baking powder with the water.  pour the water gradually.  mix until you have a solid ball of dough. it should be firm and not stick to your fingers too much.

create ping-pong sized balls and let them rest for about 10 minutes.

after 10 minutes have passed, heat up the oil in a skillet.

next, spread the dough on your hand. the thinner you stretch out the dough, the crispier it will be. my high school cafeteria used to sell these and they were stretched out thin and huge. they were bigger than our heads!

i usually like my yaniqueques a bit thick, which is why mine are smaller.

with a knife (very carefully!) make to slits in the middle of the dough.

it kind of looks like a socket.

place the yaniqueques in the hot oil and fry them until golden brown on each side.

be careful when turning them so you don’t splash yourself with hot oil. that is just not fun.

once you are done frying them, put them on a paper towel covered plate to absorb the extra oil.

and keep going.

next up… salami.

dominican salami is made of beef and pork smoked and seasoned with each company’ seasoning mix.  in my humble opinion, salami is awesome and i definitely agree that salami in dr is so much tastier, but we must do with what we get here.

i like induveca brand* but any dominican salami brand is good.

cut a few slices.  about 1 cm thick. add them to the hot oil and fry them until bright red on each side.

salami fries really quickly so keep your eye on it.  afterwards, put on a paper towel to soak up excess oil.

finally, serve your salami and yaniqueques.

and your yaniqueques and hot chocolate.

i like making a little sandwich of yaniqueque-salami-yaniqueque.

and of course, i love to dunk my yaniqueques in the hot chocolate.

yum!

elizabeth also told me that in puerto rico, they sprinkle powdered sugar of the yaniqueques and eat them as a dessert.  i suppose they taste a bit like funnel cakes, but i have never tried them like that… yet.

thank you for stopping by!

*induveca did not endorse this post. they don’t even know i wrote about them.

by the way, there are many ways to make these… some people use baking soda, others use oil and others use milk instead of warm water. this was my aunt’s recipe, which we use throughout my family.