Light, crisp , mildly buttery farmer cheese batter fried and topped with fresh raspberries and powdered sugar.

This dough is unyeasted! It gets its delicate texture and rise from kefir, baking soda with the help of boiling water to the batter. Farmer cheese adds to the texture and flavor of the funnel cake, because when you are making a single item all the ingredients have to have to be excellent!

The festival of lights calls for ample foods fried to a crispy golden brown. Sufganiyot, jelly filled doughnuts enjoyed on Hanukkah are the standard, and no one is complaining.

Yeast dough can be temperamental and daunting. Event the most experienced baker has had a terrible experience with yeast dough; the yeast could be old, the water too hot, the humidity too high, the baker in a bad mood etc.

Our family reaches consistently for Lifeway products, we have been using their cultured milk kefir and farmer cheese as far back as I can remember. I couldn’t be more excited to partner with Lifeway and celebrate the holiday season with you!

My grandmother would always fry up syrniki for a special weekend breakfast. Syrniki are Ukrainian fried pancakes made with a dry curd cheese like farmer cheese. They have all the delicious creamy milky flavor of cheesecake and a pancake rolled into one. Farmer cheese packs a good helping of nutrients and protein as well. A good thing for any breakfast or meal.

Taking inspiration from holiday breakfasts and my love of all things fried, along with SEVERAL trial runs, these are the best, most perfect, easiest one bowl funnel cakes you’ll ever make.

The Big Three Ingredients

Farmer Cheese

This is a staple in my fridge. It is a work horse of an ingredient. This little dry curd cheese does it all: eat it for breakfast with fruit and honey, spread it on toast with something savory, add it to batters and cake-the list can go on.

If I were to compare it to anything it would be ricotta cheese. Farmer cheese has a very fine curd and opposed to ricotta is cultured, containing live cultures, probiotics, 13 grams of protein per serving and for my lactose intolerant friends is naturally 99% lactose free!

Why do you need it in this recipe? For flavor and texture.

Can you leave it out? Unfortunately, not. It gives this funnel cake that fluffy chew you expect in a doughnut or funnel cake. The farmer cheese adds a rounded milky tanginess which is nice against the sweet powdered sugar.

What can I substitute for farmer cheese in this recipe? I always encourage flexibility and offer substitutions, but for this recipe the unique flavor and texture of farmer cheese is what makes this recipe work.

Kefir

This is another staple item in my fridge. My eldest enjoys a glass as part of an after school snack, or for breakfast. Kefir is a cultured dairy that is naturally 99% lactose free, packed with protein, live immunity boosting probiotics, and potentially help aid in digestion!

It is a versatile ingredient that adds its magic and flavor to everything from smoothies to cakes!

Kefir helps activate the baking soda and leaven the batter, resulting a airy crisp fried dough.

Boiling water

This is the very last step in creating the batter. Typically this technique is reserved for baking chocolate cake. Adding boiling water to cake batters often appears in older recipes but its impact on the resulting crumb of any cake shouldn’t be overlooked.

I have tried this recipe with cold, room temperate and boiling water. The result? Boiling water was the the winner. You need it, don’t skip it.

Equipment

Do I need a funnel to make funnel cake?

Funnel cake is made using a funnel, at most fares, festivals and carnivals. The sweet batter is swirled into hot oil and fried until crispy brown, topped with ample heaps of powdered sugar and then enjoyed while roaming through the sights and sounds.

You can find find lots of funnel cake funnels on Amazon.

You can also make this using a pastry bag or heavy duty zip-top bag ( look for freezer bags), with the corner cut off.

I have used both a pastry bag and a zip-top bag with 100% success rate. My kitchen oven can handle no more!

Do I need a deep fryer to make funnel cake?

A shallow frying pan with high sides for frying works perfect. Any heavy pan with high sides will for for frying these. This process is between a shallow and deep fry, because I dislike wasting oil, especially since I reserve deep frying for only a handful of times per year.

If you were planning on additional frying the same day always start with lighter items and move up to food heavier in flavor.

You’d start with something like funnel cake or potato chips, go to cauliflower, chicken and then fish. Frying after fish will result in all subsequent food tasting like fish.

Before disposing oil, make sure it completely cooled completely and thrown out with non recyclable garbage.

Do I need a thermometer to deep fry?

If using a thermometer, please purchase a food grade quality candy thermometer.

For small non commercial quantities of food, like a home kitchen, a candy thermometer is not necessary, adjust the temperature as you fry, depending how quickly your food is browning.

I always advocate for intuitive cooking, because it keeps you in the moment and creates confidence in the kitchen!

That being said, 375F is the ideal temp for frying funnel cake.

How to tell that the oil is ready for frying?

1. Use a wooden skewer or chopstick : if bubbles quickly surround the skewer, the oil is ready
2. Sprinkle a VERY TINY amount of flour over the surface: the oil begins to immediately bubble? You’re ready! make sure you hands are dry and only sprinkle in flour. Oil splatter is dangerous.
3. Coat a DRY fork with the funnel cake batter and dip it in. The oil should immediately begin to bubble. Batter browning too quickly? Lower the heat and watch your food.

In the event of a grease fire:

1. Turn off the heat immediate.
2. Slide a cover over your cooking pot (do not move it)
3. Pour salt over the fire. You would need HEAPS. I always have a large box of salt in the kitchen for cooking and brining.
4. DO NOT use water
5. DO NOT use a towel
6. DO NOT pour any other liquids or powders over the flame
7. ABSOLUTELY CALL the fire department if you don’t feel confident in performing any of these steps or the flame spreads!

Hanukkah Funnel Cake

make ahead note: fry, cool and store un-powdered funnel cakes between sheets of parchment in a airtight sealed container. Reheat in the air fryer or oven. top with powdered sugar.

Ingredients:

2 cups flour, scooped and leveled

1/4 cup Lifeway farmer cheese

1/3 cup Lifeway vanilla organic kefir

1 large egg

1 cup boiling water

1/3 cup white sugar

1 tablespoon vanilla

1/2 tsp baking soda

Method

Combine everything except the boiling water into a large mixing bowl and mix until just combined and shaggy.

To this mixture add half of the boiling water and stir to combine. Batter should resemble something between a cake and pancake batter. Too thick and it won’t funnel into the oil, too thin and it will dissolve during frying.

Frying:

EVERYTHING MUST BE BONE DRY BEFORE FRYING!

Test a small drop of batter from a fork or spoon to check for oil temperature and for consistency of the batter.

Using a tall glass lined with a zip-top bag or pastry bag laddle batter until 3/4 full.

Remove the bag and cut 1/4 inch off the corner of the bag.

Using a circular motion, swirl in the batter into hot oil. It should begin to bubble, puff up and brown almost immediately.

Fry about 3 minutes on each side and drain on a paper lined cookie sheet.

Dust with powdered sugar immediately and enjoy with fresh raspberries.