If you love the funnel cakes at amusement parks and carnivals, you’ll love this homemade funnel cakes recipe! We love funnel cakes, but they’re so expensive to buy. Using this recipe, you can make them for just pennies and our kids just LOVE them!
They’re a fun summer treat and because they’re so quick, easy and inexpensive, you can make them as a treat for the kids when they’ve been out playing all day! (Or you might just want to treat yourself! ;-)
Homemade Funnel Cakes Recipe
1 1/4 cup sifted flour
2 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1 egg
3/4 cup milk
Sift together dry ingredients. Mix egg and milk and add to dry ingredients. Stir until smooth. Pour oil into a skillet and heat to 375 degrees. Holding finger over the end of a funnel, pour in 1/4 cup batter. Holding over the hot oil, remove finger and let drizzle over the hot oil. As batter flows, move funnel in a circle to form a spiral cake.* Fry about 2 minutes on each side, turning once until golden brown. Remove from oil and drain. Sprinkle with powdered sugar, glaze or nuts. Makes 6 cakes.
*If you find it too hard using the funnel, try putting the batter in a squeeze bottle (the kind you can get at the Dollar Store to put ketchup and mustard in) then squeeze the batter into the oil making a straight line and make sticks instead of the round “cake” shape.
This recipe is from our cookbook:
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Yummmm! My family will SO love this (me, too–). How deep should the oil be in the skillet? Thanks for your great newsletter & recipes!
My local amusement park sells these topped with strawberries and whipped cream. I made a huge batch last spring while strawberries were in season, and my family loved them.
How much oil is required to make this “Funnel Cakes” recipe?
You just pour 1 1/2 in – 2 in. of oil in the pan to fry them in like you would when you deep fat fry something. Just enough so the batter won’t touch the bottom of the pan as it puffs up.
I have the Dining on a Dime cookbook. Why do the measurements and ingredients vary a bit from what is published in the cookbook?
A couple of different reasons Beth. Sometimes we have more then one version of the same recipe all of which are really good so we will post the different one from the book just to give everyone different options.
Another reason is many of my recipes Tawra and/or the publisher used my recipe which maybe didn’t have exact measurements and tweaked it a little. I write most of the menus and recipes we post on the web site and I just pull out my recipe box and use them straight from there and not the book. I was wondering when someone was going to notice that. May have to do things different.
In a few cases and they are getting fewer thank goodness for what ever reason there has been a mistake in the book. We try to let everyone know as soon as we find one but sometimes when I use my recipe then it will be different too from the book.
Thanks for your response Jill. I wrote the differences into the cookbook and will try each of them. I LOVE Funnel Cakes, but can’t justify paying $5 or more for one at the fair.
Oh my goodness, I have all the ingredients except ONE, the funnel!! Can I use a regular cup or something else instead? Thanks! Gonna try these later today if I can.
You might try a measuring cup and hold it high above the oil letting the batter sort of slowly drizzle out in a stream.
I pour the batter into a gallon zip lock bag and cut one of the corners of the bag. To close up the hole I use a bread twist tie.
This sounds so yummy! I love the funnel cakes that I have eaten (not too often) at fairs and other public events.
My only comment would be to ensure that you are using the right kind of skillet for deep frying, i.e., something heavy like cast iron. Do NOT use your good stainless steel pans, because deep frying with hot oil will ruin them.
I would add that when I bought my set of stainless steel (Tramontina Gourmet, to be exact, which was highly rated by Americas Test Kitchen, right up there with the very expensive All-Clad brand) specifically instructed to not use them for deep frying or other high-heat cooking like stir-fry.
Can you use this recipe in a Fry-Daddy?
I don’t know why not. You probably couldn’t do it in a basket but would have to put it straight into the oil. You can make them as big or small as you want.
My family loves your super simple funnel cake recipe. Sometimes when my kids are wanting donuts, I drop a spoonfuls of batter into the oil instead of making a circular shape then roll them in cinnamon sugar, powdered sugar or make a powdered sugar glaze.
Oh and I do use my Fry Daddy to make both the funnel cakes and the donuts. I just have smaller funnel cakes as an end result.
If you don’t have a funnel you can cut the top few inches off a soda or water bottle and use that.
I’m thinking you could even use a pastry bag…
we love funnel cakes .. and i make homemade zeppoli’s too .. using dough .. and then frying them .. and then sprinkling them with the powdered sugar .. my friend just uses the cheapest roll of biscuits and fries them and then sprinkles them with powdered sugar or cinnamon sugar .. ;D
All Purpose or Self Rising Flour? Sorry, I don’t bake and don’t know the difference. Thanks!
All purpose. Self rising already has the baking powder in it. Here is our article on it. https://www.livingonadime.com/all-purpose-flour-self-rising-cake-bleached/
It is our family tradition to celebrate New Year’s morning with funnel cakes.
What a fun idea Linda. We always think of funnel cakes as a summer thing but they would be perfect in winter and for a special day.
Can you use pancake batter?
Not really Dolly. You maybe could but the taste and texture would not be the same really at all so they would not be like the funnel cakes you get at the fair or some place like that.
I bought the 20th Anniversary Dining On a Dime cookbook. But they didn’t have sugar in the recipe and other recipes I have seen do. I then noticed that the book’s recipe didn’t have baking soda listed either and the ingredient amounts were different than the one on this page. I want to know if the recipe in my book needs to be corrected and if it is just a different recipe or if it is an error in the recipe.
Thanks will check it out. I think your recipe is ok. Like a lot of recipes they differ. About 1/2 of the have sugar and the rest don’t and some have more baking powder and no baking soda or different amounts of each. You can use either recipe and they should work ok but I will check with Mike about changing them so it won’t be so confusing.
Could you do a version of these for an air fryer?