TGE Recipes: Buñuelos with Lewis Gallardo of Sweet Lew and the Sweet and Lows
Welcome to TGE Recipes, a place where our favorite bands share the secrets straight from their kitchens. Think your favorite Food Network show except on a purple blog. Today we welcome Lewis Gallardo of Sweet Lew and the Sweet and Lows.
Buñuelos
Ingredients:
- 4 Cups - Flour
- 1 Tbsp. - Baking Powder
- 1 Tbsp. - Salt
- ½ Cup - Sugar
- ½ Cup - Brown Sugar
- ¼ Cup - Shortening
- 2 Cups - Water
- 1 Cup - Vegetable Oil
Directions:
Toss the flour and baking powder in a larger bowl, and start cutting in the shortening with a fork or two. In the culinary sense, I think “cutting in” means to mix shortening or butter with dry ingredients such as flour or sugar. That’s what my high school cooking teacher told me.
Once you’ve pretty much reached ~ equilibrium ~ (after cutting in the shortening for a minute or two) add some hot water to the dry ingredients. Not too much! If you added too much add some flour to the mix to dry things up. Things are about to get messy.
Use your hands to miix up all of your ingredients in your bowl to get a giant dough ball. Quarter up your dough orb and rip off pieces to ball up to about the size of a golf ball.
As you’re ripping off pieces, add warm water (about ¼ of a cup at a time) so it can retain it’s shape and doesn’t get too dry. Once desired amount of pre-tortilla dough balls are rolled up, set a wet towel over the bowl lid to maintain a cool temperature and set the dough balls to rest for about 10-20 minutes.
Once you’ve reached the point when you can’t wait any longer, grab a rolling pin and flatten each ball to so it winds up looking like a tortilla. Once an even circle, throw on a grill or flat heated surface stove thing to heat up. Air bubbles are ok!
We’re halfway done. If making handmade tortillas was your goal, then you’re all done. But most people signed up for a dessert, so let’s continue.
Put your vegetable oil in a pan so that it’s about an inch deep and heat it up so it’s very very very hot. This is where you bring out your oil splash guard if you have one. CAREFULLY slide the tortilla in the oil and let it “deep” fry. Flip it after about a minute. Once it’s golden brown and rigid, it’s time to toss it around in a plate with your sugars.
If your buñuelos looks similar to the one pictured, you’re probably done! Enjoy.
Interview with Lewis from Andrew Lopez
When you cook do you listen to a particular kind of music or genre?
I’ll get stuck on stuff. I’ll find a song or an album and run it into the ground. Right now I’ve been listening to NxWorries, that Anderson.Paak & Knxwldge thing, I’ve listened to that record so many damn times. Lots of motown, or African funk. Just stuff I could move around to while I cook.
I know you applied to be featured on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert, how did you choose a song to record?
We’re sitting on like four songs right now and we chose that one, it’s called “Hard Knock”. It was super last minute and we recorded the day before the deadline. The video we uploaded was actually shot with a laptop and an iPhone.
“Shot on iPhone 6”?
Actually it was an iPhone 5 *laughs*. We didn’t have a PA so I couldn’t hear myself sing and we were trying to get it done by midnight because we thought the deadline was then but it was actually midnight the following day. It was super frustrating but also kind of nice getting to listen back to it. We also have another video of us out there right now where we did a benefit show for this place called the Liberation Institute in the Mission. They provide affordable mental healthcare in the Mission neighborhood for those who need it. You can go to an actual therapist and pay like $15 or $20 to have a full session with a therapist.
How’d that come together?
We linked up with a friend of ours in his band Jerry’s Timeshare who started Back Production Collective and hit us up saying that they wanted to put a benefit show on for us and when they asked me what organization we’d like to support and that’s the one that stuck out to us.
Sweet Lew and the Sweet and Lows plans on recording soon, so make sure to follow them on Facebook to stay up to date with the trio's upcoming musical endeavors.