Puff-puff
African fried dough snack and pastry
title: "Puff-puff" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["nigerian-cuisine", "sudanese-cuisine", "ghanaian-cuisine", "ivorian-cuisine", "guinean-cuisine", "togolese-cuisine", "liberian-cuisine", "democratic-republic-of-the-congo-cuisine", "angolan-cuisine", "cameroonian-cuisine", "doughnuts"] description: "African fried dough snack and pastry" topic_path: "geography/nigeria" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puff-puff" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary African fried dough snack and pastry ::
::data[format=table title="Infobox prepared food"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| name | Puff-puff |
| image | File:Nigerian-puff-puff-recipe cropped.jpg |
| image_size | 200px |
| place_of_origin | Nigeria |
| course | Snack |
| type | Doughnut |
| main_ingredient | Flour, yeast, sugar, salt, butter, water, eggs, vegetable oil |
| variations | Boflot, kala, mikate, togbei, beignet dougoup |
| :: |
| name = Puff-puff | image = File:Nigerian-puff-puff-recipe cropped.jpg | image_size = 200px | caption = | place_of_origin = Nigeria | creator = | course = Snack | type = Doughnut | served = | main_ingredient = Flour, yeast, sugar, salt, butter, water, eggs, vegetable oil | variations = Boflot, kala, mikate, togbei, beignet dougoup | calories = | other =
Puff-puff is a traditional snack made of fried dough and eaten across Africa, especially in the west of the continent. The name "puff-puff" is from Nigeria; as listed below, many other names and varieties of the pastry exist.
Puff-puffs are generally made of dough containing flour, yeast, sugar, butter, salt, water and eggs (which are optional), and deep-fried in vegetable oil to a golden-brown color. Baking powder can be used as a replacement for yeast, but yeast is a better option. After frying, puff-puffs can be rolled in sugar. Like the French beignet and the Italian zeppole, puff-puffs can be rolled in any spice or flavoring such as cinnamon, vanilla and nutmeg. They may be served with a fruit dip of strawberry or raspberry.
Varieties and other names
In Francophone West Africa it is known as gato in Guinea and Mali (from the French gateau) and beignet in Senegal and Cameroon, as well as in The Gambia. A common Senegalese variety uses millet flour rather than wheat. Cameroonians accompany beignets with beans.
Other names for the dish include buffloaf (or bofrot) in Ghana, botokoin in Togo, bofloto in the Ivory Coast, mikate in Congo, micate or bolinho in Angola, fungasa in Chad, legemat in Sudan, kala in Liberia, and vetkoek, amagwinya, or magwinya in South Africa, Botswana and Zimbabwe, and burmasa in Burkina Faso. The prominence of this dish stretches even to the southern and eastern edges of Africa, where it is mostly known as mandazi.
A similar dish can be found in Tonga, where it is known as keke‘isite (literally, yeast cake). The recipe is almost identical to that of puff-puff; however, it is sometimes fried in shortening or drippings instead of vegetable oil.
References
References
- "The puff-puff: A Nigerian delicacy".
- (2021-07-24). "How To Make Puff Puff".
- (10 May 2018). "Beignets dougoub (beignets de mil soufflés)".
- (11 October 2012). "Nigerian Food Recipes TV| Nigerian Food blog, Nigerian Cuisine, Nigerian Food TV, African Food Blog: Nigerian Puff Puff Recipe : How to make Puff puff". Nigerianfoodtv.com.
- "Keke 'Isite".
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