I’ve talked about beignets before, and despite not having much of a sweet tooth, they were something that I was really looking forward to trying. These are small puffy doughnuts that New Orleans are famous for. Probably the most famous place to have these is Cafe Du Monde. We were staying in the French Quarter and luckily so was this place, so we braved the scorching heat to find it.
Cafe du Monde is a crazy busy place and they really just do coffee and beignets. We grabbed a couple of each (a portion is 3) and waited in anticipation for my first try.
Beignets are small little doughnuts absolutely coated in powdered sugar, they arrived warm, crisp and doughy – and very nice indeed. Perfect for a mid afternoon snack!
Of course we needed to try beignets somewhere else (for purely research purposes of course) so the next day we headed to the catchily named New Orleans Famous Beignets and Coffee. We had overheard one of the many tour guides here say to his group, that these were the best beignets in NOLA – and a much shorter queue.
These were different, they weren’t crispy like the ones above but they were lighter and fluffier and less doughy – they also had a sweeter flavour. As you can see the Cafe Du Monde were more unusual shapes, whilst these were more uniform. I was torn – they were both so good – I loved the crispy ends and crust of the first, but the fluffiness and taste of the second – decisions, decisions.
All told, beignets are pretty great even for someone who isn’t really a sweets or doughnut fan, light crispy and tasty, I will miss our little 4pm snack each day when I leave NOLA – but sure Nashville will offer up an alternative!
If you fancy trying to make these (I know I will) I found this Beignet recipe here for something close to the original Cafe Du Monde version.
Peaberry Blog 