Sopapillas...the things that dreams are made of!

When I was a kid, we went to Casa Bonita restaurant near Denver a couple of times.  It was so exciting!  As an adult, I would probably think it was tacky.  But as a child...ohhhh, the beauty of it!  It was dark and mysterious, with trails/bridges leading this way and that.  There was Black Bart's Cave, a treasure chest you could pick an item out of, and cliff divers!  Yes, inside!!!  It also had some strange gorilla act involving that cliff diver, but most of all, my favorite part was the sopapillas!  They gave you as many as you wanted, too!  They seemed huge to me at the time since I was so small.  They were hot and so chewy, airy, delicious!  I got a hankering for making these because I've been making Mexican food lately (to be posted soon), so I Googled Casa Bonita Sopapillas and came up with this recipe.  I was so excited!  I had to make them right away!  Here's what you need:

Ingredients:
2C Flour, sifted
1/2C Water (may need more...add it by the teaspoon full)
2T Lard or Shortening
2t  Baking Powder
1t Salt
4C Veg Oil

Start by sifting your flour, baking powder and salt together.

Add in your shortening/lard

Cover the shortening with the flour mixture.  Using quick motions with your

hand break apart the shortening, all the while, trying not to touch the shortening too long.

The trick is to always keep some flour between your fingers and the shortening.

Man, that's hard to describe.  Anyway, you could always use a pastry cutter.

Your end product should look something like this.

Add in your water.  I just used cold.  I got to thinking about this.

Some recipes said to use very warm, but that will just melt the 

shortening.  I'm thinking of this kind of like a pie crust.  I don't

want the shortening to melt or the dough to be overworked.

Mix together.  It will take about a minute for the whole thing to come

together.  At first, you'll think there's no way it will, but it will.  Mine

seemed realllly dry with only 1/2C water, so I added some more a

teaspoon full at a time.  Dough should not be dry, but not sticky.

Roll into a ball and cover with a towel.  In this recipe,

there's apparently no need to let it rest, which is fine with me.

At this point, I put my grease on to heat up.  It's important to have

it at 400 degrees, so use a candy thermometer and watch it carefully.

While your grease is heating, spread some flour on a flat surface,

roll out your dough and cut into (relatively) square pieces.  I used

my old pizza cutter that has a little squiggle in it, like my husband

tried to use it for a screwdriver or something.  No, I haven't been

hitting the sauce, contrary to popular opinion, lol!

Because I knew it would just be me and Tommy, I used only a few

and put the rest on a sheet tray to freeze for later use.  Let's hope that works.

Slip your dough into the hot oil.  I say slip because it seemed the

ones I lay on top didn't puff as well.  So, slip them down into the

oil.  They puff up right away.  Once they puff, you can turn them.

They truly only take about 30 seconds total.  What's funny is, 

when you turn them over, they tend to 'fart' around the pan, lol!

They sputter and scoot around like a little motor boat.  Weird!

Remove from oil and put on paper towel to drain for a minute.

Do yourself a favor and do not bite into one right away.  These have

a lot of hot steam that escapes and you can burn your widdle wips. You
can serve these up a multitude of ways.  Rolled in cinammon sugar,
with a sprinkling of powdered sugar, or take a bite and drizzle some

honey on the inside, as shown below.  That's how they're served at
Casa Bonita. You bite it yourself.  They don't come with a bite out of it.  Never mind.

Notes: You can just eat them plain as they apparently do in New Mexico. According to my (quick and minimal) research, these originated in New Mexico a couple of hundred years ago.  I always just assumed they were (Old? LOL!) Mexican. I guess they're served with most meals in a savory fashion, as you and I might have bread.  Interesting, yes?

As with most homemade bread items, these were really inexpensive to make.  I'm calculating it to be about 48 cents!  Since this made about 20 whole ones and a bunch of little pieces which I won't count, that's only 2.4 cents each.  I'd say that's pretty cheap!

These were sooooo good. While they didn't quite seem the same as Casa Bonita, I think that may be because perhaps they use real lard.  Not really sure, but either way, they were heaven on a plate!  These are designed to be eaten right away, so if you fry them all, plan on using them within a couple of hours or they get all soggy and grease-logged.  When I try out my frozen ones in the future, I'll let you know how that comes out.
Have a happy day!  If you eat one of these, you definitely will!
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