Nuegados de yuca are El Salvador’s irresistible Easter fritters: grated cassava and cheese fried into crisp-outside, chewy-inside bites, then drowned in miel de panela — a spiced raw-sugar syrup with cinnamon and cloves.
The salty-cheese-meets-caramel-syrup combination is the whole show: crunchy, soft, sweet and savory in a single bite. They are traditional for Semana Santa, but nobody polices the calendar.
Cassava (yuca) is easy to find fresh or frozen at Latin markets — the one non-negotiable step is squeezing the grated root as dry as you can, which keeps the fritters together in the oil.
Nuegados de Yuca Recipe
What you need
Ingredients
- For the nuegados:
- 2 cups grated raw cassava (yuca), squeezed dry
- 2 eggs
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- 1 cup grated hard cheese (or flour, as an alternative)
- Salt, to taste
- Oil or lard, for frying
- For the panela syrup:
- 1 cup panela pieces
- 1 cup water
- 2 cinnamon sticks
- 3 whole cloves
Cook along
Instructions
- Combine the grated cassava, eggs, baking powder, salt and cheese into a smooth dough.
- Heat oil or lard in a skillet over medium-high heat.
- With wet hands, shape the dough into balls and flatten slightly.
- Fry in small batches until golden on both sides, about 3 minutes per side. Drain on paper towels.
- For the syrup: dissolve the panela in the water with the cinnamon and cloves over medium heat, stirring.
- Simmer over low heat 10 to 15 minutes, until it lightly coats a spoon.
- Arrange the nuegados on a platter, drizzle generously with the warm syrup, and serve.
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