What Are Spanish Churros? (And How to Order Them to Avoid “Churro-Regret”!)

When you’re in Spain, you’re bound to have churros at least once.

I mean, why wouldn’t you? They are literally doughnuts that have been deep-fried and dipped in chocolate.

If that doesn’t sound amazing to you, you might be a robot. (Or you might be on the Keto diet. In which case, go and count your macros somewhere else, thank-you-very-much!).

But the thing is, when I came to Spain, I wasn’t 100% sure of what churros really were. I’d definitely had something called a churro before, but was that the same thing in Spain?

If this sounds at all familiar to you—don’t worry. You’re not alone in this, and I know of plenty of people who have ordered churros without knowing what they’re ordering (or even how to order them properly!).

Luckily, I’ve eaten my fair share of churros here in Spain. So let me be your guide as we unpack the culture of churros in Spain, and how exactly to approach them as a foreigner!

What are churros?

My first experience with churros was as a kid growing up in Australia. At fairs and festivals, you could get these dodgy looking sticks of dough from even dodgier food trucks, covered in cinnamon and sugar.

So, when I learnt how popular churros are in Spain, my first thought was: why?

But it turns out, these Spanish treats are worlds away from the fried snacks of my memories!

How Churros Are Made

The humble combination of flour, water, and a pinch of salt, churros are one of the greatest breakfast foods humans have ever created.

(Just not in terms of nutritional value. Seriously, these calories are emptier than my wallet after going out for churros).

Churros start their life off as a simple, savoury dough like any other. But then, things get weird. First, you shape them with a machine that looks like a cross between a Playdough extruder and a spaghetti maker.

Next, those Playdough noodles get tubed into a vat of frying oil and sizzled until crispy and golden. Fun fact: churros are most often fried in Spanish olive oil. This means it’s healthy (or as anything fried can be!). Phew!

In many cities throughout Spain and Portugal, the traditional churro comes in a star shape. The extra ridges mean the churro has more surface area, so it’ll get crispier when fried. It also means the churro won’t burst when the dough starts to expand in the heat of the oil.

In Andalucía, however, the standard churro is a different shape.

It’s a shape that the rest of Spain would know as porras. By adding a spoonful of baking soda and letting the dough rise before frying, these particular sticks are thicker, but airy, fluffy, and light in the centre—sometimes completely hollow!

This makes them even better for scooping up the thick, dark drinking chocolate, cinnamon sugar, or dulce de leche (a caramel made from condensed milk) that they are served with.

Of course, you can just have churros with a café con leche for a more savoury option. But I think if you’re going to have the caloric equivalent of jet fuel for breakfast, why skimp on the sugar?

How to order churros in Spain

Alright, so you’ve decided to eat churros. Great work: you’re going to have a good time.

But the next step is putting your Spanish language skills to the test, and actually ordering them!

Most Spanish people will order their churros “con chocolate” (with chocolate), or con café (with coffee). But you can also have them by themselves, or just sprinkle some sugar on top for a lighter breakfast.

Generally speaking, the size of a plate of churros will change depending on which bar you’re in. A media (half-plate) generally has 3-4 sticks, while a full plate (ración) will have roughly double.

I always find that two sticks makes for a good light breakfast, while 4-5 leaves me very full!

Avoiding “churro-regret”

Unfortunately, good churros can be hard to find, even in their Iberian birthplace! And when it comes to these tubes of carbohydrates cooked in fat and dipped in sugar, there is a big difference between good and bad.

At their best, churros make you feel like you’re walking on air and have sunshine in your veins.

Bad ones make you feel like you’re walking underwater and have dangerously high levels of cholesterol in your veins (because you do).

This is what I like to call “churro-regret”: the feeling you get 20 minutes after eating particularly poor porras or chunderous churros. This is when your forehead and backs of your knees start sweating, your stomach groans, and you feel like you’ve lost 10 years of your life.

But if you manage to avoid churro-regret and get yourself some crispy, golden-brown, fried-to-order churros, you’ll have one of the greatest breakfast experiences that Spain has to offer[1].

And for the more nutritionally-minded; don’t be. Sure, there are healthier ways to start the day, but you’re a good person so you deserve to treat yourself.

This History of Churros: From China with pastry

“Fusion” is the current buzzword in tapas. But it turns out that churros are the original fusion food of Spain! While there are many origin stories for churros, my favourite is that Portuguese sailors stole the idea from Chinese street food vendors.

When traders from Portugal first opened contact with Ming Dynasty China in the early 16th century, they were exposed to a vast array of new foods. One of these was youtiao.

Derived from a Cantonese phrase meaning “old fried devil”, youtiao is a fried, savoury dough eaten as part of a breakfast, in the form of two sticks joined in the middle.

Other churros scholars (#careergoals) believe the dish comes from Spanish shepherds who would fry flour and water rather than bake it into bread. They named the sticks of dough after the curved horns of their sheep, a breed known as “churra“!

As they travelled the land with their sheep, the shepherds spread this delicious pastry throughout Spain.

But as with most origin myths for Spanish foods, the truth is probably both, or neither. Or it’s both and neither at the same time. The only thing that really matters is that churros are here, and they’re delicious!

Read more

Are you wondering where to go and eat these beautiful dough sticks the next time you’re in Spain? Check out my list of the best churros in Seville!

And if you’re after more sweet treats, take a look at my picks for the nine best Spanish desserts in the country!

Notes

[1] Okay, so technically you can also get churros for an afternoon snack, from about 5pm-8pm. But whenever I’ve gone for afternoon churros, I’ve found that it leads to a sleepless night spent lying on my side like a pregnant woman in her third trimester.