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Crostoli
Donna

Crostoli Recipe

Crostoli are a crispy fried Italian pastry which are popular during Carnevale which occurs just before Lent. However these are also popular at Christmas and many other celebrations. These go by many names - Italian bow tie cookies, chiacchiere, angel wing cookies, bugie and more. Try stopping at just one - impossible!
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Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 1 hour
Rest the dough 30 minutes
Total Time 1 hour 20 minutes
Servings: 100 crostoli
Course: Cookies
Cuisine: Italian
Calories: 14
Ingredients Equipment Method

Ingredients
  

Ingredients
  • 2 cups plain all purpose flour (See Note 1)
  • 2 whole eggs
  • 1 egg yolk
  • 2 tablespoon granulated white sugar
  • 2 tablespoons butter (slightly softened)
  • 1 tablespoon brandy (See note 2)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 2 cups peanut oil (for frying, See note 3)
  • powdered sugar (for dusting)

Equipment

  • pasta machine
  • frypan

Method
 

Instructions
  1. Place the all purpose flour on a clean work surface.
  2. Make a well in the centre. Add the eggs, egg yolk, sugar, butter, brandy, vanilla extract and salt.
  3. Use your fingertips or a fork to gradually blend the wet ingredient slowly gathering in flour until the dough starts to come together. Add a little more brandy if needed to form a ball.
  4. Knead for about 5 minutes until the dough is smooth and elastic.
  5. Rest the dough for 30 minutes.
  6. Cut small portion of dough off the “mother” dough.
  7. Flatten the smaller piece and begin to pass through the pasta machine on the widest setting.
  8. Fold and pass it through the widest setting. Continue to fold and pass through the pasta machine 5 or 6 times until the dough is smooth.
  9. Dust with extra flour as required.
  10. Begin to reduce the setting until you are at the finest setting.
  11. Pass the dough through the finest setting and place the length of dough on to your work surface. With the Kitchen Aid Pasta roller, I find I need to go through the thinest setting twice. You could also manually (but carefully) stretch the dough to ensure it is as thin.
  12. Cut the dough along the length into about 2 inches (5 centimeter) strips which will be approximately 4 -6 inches (10-15 centimeters) long. This is just to give you an idea but really how you cut is up to you.
  13. I make a small cut in the middle of each piece and twist one end through the cut, as you can see above.
  14. Heat oil in a heavy, high sided frypan.
  15. When the oil is hot (350°F/180ºC) slip in 3 or 4 crostoli (or more depending on the diameter of the frypan).
  16. Work quickly because they take about 30 seconds (or less) to cook on each side if you have the oil hot enough. Turn them (I like to use two forks) once a lot of bubbles have formed and before they colour too deeply. Crostoli should be light golden in colour. If they are brown, they are burnt.
  17. When cooked on both sides, remove them and drain them on absorbent paper. Crostoli will be a little soft but will become more crisp on cooling. If crostoli take too long to cook, it means that the oil is not hot enough, and they will absorb too much oil, resulting in heavy crostoli.
  18. When cool, dust generously with powdered sugar.
  19. Store in an airtight container for two weeks.