Skip to main content
Dessert

El Salvador Buñuelos

Fried dough balls flavored with cinnamon and sugar, typical of Salvadoran cuisine.

From the Recipes Wiki (Fandom) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Flour and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,341 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

El Salvador Buñuelos

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Mix the flour, baking powder and sugar well.

  2. Add the egg and shortening and mix until both are absorbed by the flour.

  3. Add water a little at a time until it becomes a dough consistency (like tortillas).

Shape and rest

  1. Roll small balls of the dough (about 1/2 the size of your hand) into pancake-like shapes.

  2. Let them sit for awhile so they can dry a bit, which keeps them from absorbing too much oil when you fry them.

Fry and finish

  1. Deep fry the buñuelos and sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar.

  2. They should be nice and crisp.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

809Calories
20 gProtein
32 gFat
110 gCarbs

Counts 6 of 7 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Olive Oil1 tbsp (14g)119
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Cinnamon1 tsp ground (2.6g)6
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

Recipe from the Recipes Wiki (Fandom).

Steps grouped into stages for easier reading; the method is the source's own.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the dough structure that becomes crisp when fried.
Egg
Adds richness and binds the dough together.
Shortening
Adds fat that tenderizes the dough and keeps it from toughening.
Baking powder
Releases gas that lightens the dough so it puffs when fried.

The step that matters

Resting the shaped dough. Letting the shaped dough sit lets its surface dry slightly, so it absorbs less frying oil and fries up crisp rather than greasy.

Swap the cinnamon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, egg):

  1. Jalapenofits about as well
  2. Cinnamonthe original
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Capersfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Cinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipes