Simple sweet Debla!

Today I made debla for the second time after taking its recipe from my sister during the first days of Ramandan. And again it turned out just as wonderful as it did the first time. Crisp, light and sweet!

I've always be drawn to debla recipes but I'm immediately put down when I see how they all involve complex shape forming or rolling dough around the fork or your fingers in some not to mention to the long ingredients list. I even tried the Moroccan shabakeyia. I love its taste when presented to me ready made. Making it myself however hasn't been such a pleasure! Nonetheless, even a quick online search for debla recipes proved useless. The simple easy yet tasty debla recipe was in my own sister's hands.

Below are photos of today's debla in its simplistic shape: a bow! And the recipe is even simpler with only 3 ingredients. The availability of pasta making machine is a bonus but not a necessity. Rolling the dough out thinly with a rolling pin after it has rested for 30 minutes or so is no sweating business. Neither is cutting it into rectangular shapes and firmly pressing or folding them in the middle to voila a bow shape! And lets not talk about how good it tastes because nothing does that better than giving it a try yourself.

Here's the recipe:

2 cups flour
pinch of salt (literally a small pinch of salt between your fingers)
1/4 cup oil
1/4 cup water

Knead the above ingredients into a slightly hard ball. IF the dough is still floury (I am not sure if that's a word) but what i mean there are still remains of flour and you are having a hard time collecting the dough together add 1 tbsp oil and 1 tbsp water and keep adding slowly equal tablespoons of both liquids until you can collect the dough into a slightly hard ball. The quality of flour determines how much oil and water are exactly needed. Leave the dough to rest covered well for 30 to 40 minutes.

After it has rested, divide the dough into two portions. Leaving one portion covered, work with the other portion rolling out the dough from the center outwards using a rolling pin until you have a thin semi-transparent sheet of dough. My counter-top is beige brown with a grayish/black marble effect. And I know the dough is thin enough when its slightly transparent showing the grayish black marks beneath it on the counter-top.

Cut the dough into rectangular shapes. I like them about 3cm by 6 cm in size. Then pinch the dough in the middle or fold it in the center to get a bow-like shape. Make sure you pinch firmly so the dough doesn't open up back to a rectangular shape in hot oil once you deep fry it. Having oil heated to medium heat will deep fry the debla in a few minutes. Once light golden drain on paper napkins to get rid of excess oil. Then stick them in sugar-water syrup (2 cups sugar, 1 cup water, juice of half lemon cooked until slightly thick) for a few seconds to coat them then take out drain of excess syrup and serve. One last tip, adding a bit of vanilla infused sugar to the the syrup just before use and after it has cooked gives the debla this amazing light vanilla taste (and smell for that matter)!