Fat Tuesday is a day I support in a two-fisted manner, with both of my fists covered with powdered sugar. The idea behind Fat Tuesday, or in French, Mardi Gras, is that sinners get one last day of indulgence before facing 40 days of mortification, also known as Lent.

I have always been keen on the indulgence aspect of this transaction and pretty feeble on the mortification.

Among the foods that shout "pleasure binge," doughnuts lead the chorus. The prime example of a Fat Tuesday doughnut is a beignet. These are the puffy, crusty treats that residents of New Orleans - folks who know a thing or two about Mardi Gras - embrace as their doughnuts.

They are dough fried in hot oil, usually doused with powdered sugar. The only aspect of your health that they might improve is your mental health. But they are so good that after you polish off a plate or two, you feel so fine that you could almost cuddle up to a calorie-counting dietitian. Almost.

Like many visitors to New Orleans, I got my first taste of beignets at Cafe du Monde, a largely open-air cafe on Canal Street near Jackson Square. When you sit at the tiny tables, sipping dark cafe au lait and eating pieces of hot, sweet dough, life seems very smooth. There are whole rafts of ways you can get yourself in trouble in New Orleans, but eating several orders of beignets at Cafe du Monde is one of the most benign.

So to get ready for next week's Fat Tuesday, I made several batches of beignets. I made one batch with yeast dough, following a recipe I found in "Joy of Cooking."

When working with this yeast dough, you have to delay your gratification. That seems contradictory when you are dealing with doughnuts, but the dough has to sit for at least 16 hours in the fridge before the frying starts. I let mine chill for 24 hours. It produced beignets that were pillows of delight.

I made another batch without yeast, using a recipe from the family cookbook of Cajun chef Paul Prudhomme. These beignets were denser, more like cake doughnuts. Dangerously good.

Both were fried in hot oil, a process that can be tricky. I had to keep the temperature of my oil at 365 degrees when frying the yeast beignets, 350 degrees when cooking the Prudhomme recipe. Fortunately, I had a candy thermometer that clipped on to the side of my pot. I manipulated the fire under the pot to keep the temperature in the acceptable range.

Experienced beignet makers warn novices like me not to crowd the pot. So I fried no more than six beignets at a time, keeping a close eye on the thermometer.

The yeast beignets produced a pleasant surprise as they cooked; they expanded like little balloons. It was great entertainment, especially the first time it happened. I had rolled out the dough with a marble rolling pin and cut it into 2-inch squares. Then I dropped the squares in the hot oil, and miracle of miracles, they puffed up. I thought, "That's probably what is going to happen to my stomach, too."

The Prudhomme beignets were heavier, but when they hit the hot oil, they floated in the pot like a bobber on a fishing line on a windy day.

Using a slotted spoon, I scooped the now-brown beauties out of the oil and onto paper towels to dry, and sprinkled them with powdered sugar.

I had spent the morning shoveling snow, so as I settled in front of my plate of beignets, I was eager to eat my reward.

My first batch of yeast beignets was OK but did not produce the sweet thrill I had expected. They were tough. I think I had left them too long in the hot oil; their skin was a very dark brown. So the next batch stayed in oil only long enough to give the skin a slightly golden tone. They were better, but still not up to my memory of the Cafe du Monde beignets.

I called New Orleans for guidance.

"You overmixed the dough," Burt Benrud, vice president of Cafe du Monde, told me when I described my doughnut-making troubles to him.

Benrud said that when beignet dough has been mixed too long, or when the proper amount of moisture has not been added, the dough gets stiff, and beignets get tough.

He suggested that next time I use the Cafe du Monde beignet mix, sold on its Web site, cafedumonde.com.

I fried my beignets in peanut oil, but Benrud stood by the cafe's practice of frying beignets in cottonseed oil. Occasionally, the cooks at Cafe du Monde have tried to fry the beignets in other types of oil, "just to amuse the oil salesmen," he said. But the results have not been good.

"We take a bag home to the kids, and they stick they nose in the bag and say, 'These are not beignets.' So Cafe du Monde sticks to its cottonseed oil tradition. It has been handed down for generations," Benrud said. "We don't mess with success."

As for how long to leave them in the fryer, Benrud said, the pros cook by color. "We go for that nice golden color," he said adding the usual amount of time in the fryer is 2 1/2 minutes.

The flavor of the oil can affect the taste of the beignets, he said. Benrud, for instance, prefers the beignets fried on Sunday nights. At the end of a busy weekend, the oil is well-seasoned, he explained, giving the Sunday-night beignets a distinctive crispy crust.

In his cookbook, Prudhomme says his mother used to make beignets for special occasions, "like rainy days or to serve with coffee for special company at night after supper." They don't have to be sweet, he wrote, saying his mother did not sprinkle hers with powdered sugar and often ate them with scrambled eggs.

The other night in snowy Baltimore, I applied plenty of powdered sugar to Prudhomme's cakey beignets, and as well as to several plates of their puffed up, yeasty companions. In other words, I was eating in Fat Tuesday-style.

Paul Prudhomme's BeignetsMakes: 2 dozen

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons baking powder

1 tablespoon sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons milk

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 large egg

2 cups vegetable oil for frying

Cane syrup, molasses or powdered sugar (optional)

In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt, 1/2 cup of the milk, the 2 tablespoons of oil and the egg. Mix until well blended and any big lumps of flour and baking powder are broken up. Add the remaining 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons milk, stirring vigorously until only tiny lumps remain and batter is the consistency of pancake batter, about 5 minutes.

In a deep skillet or fryer, heat at least 1 1/2 inches of oil to 350 degrees. Slide batter by large tablespoons into the hot oil, (use another tablespoon to push batter off). Fry in single-layer batches until dark golden brown on both sides, 4 to 6 minutes, turning at least once. Do not crowd. Maintain temperature as close to 350 as possible.

Drain on paper towels and serve immediately as is or with cane syrup or molasses, or sprinkled with powdered sugar.

From: The Prudhomme Family Cookbook, by Paul Prudhomme (Morrow 1987)

Nutrition informationPer serving: 101 calories, 6 grams fat, 1 grams saturated fat, 9 grams carbohydrates, 2 grams protein, trace fiber, 9 milligrams cholesterol, 244 milligrams sodium

New Orleans BeignetsMakes: About 30 2 1/2 -inch beignets

3/4 cup lukewarm water

1 teaspoon active dry yeast

1/2 cup evaporated milk

1/4 cup sugar

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon salt

4 cups all-purpose flour

3 tablespoons butter, softened

2 cups vegetable oil

Combine water and yeast in a large bowl, let stand for 5 minutes, whisk until yeast is dissolved.

Whisk in the milk, sugar, egg and salt, blending well. Then add 2 cups of the flour, beating with a large spoon until a smooth batter forms.

Beat in the butter, then thoroughly beat in the additional 2 cups of flour.

Cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 12 hours, or up to 24.

Pour 3 inches of oil into a heavy pot or deep skillet, and heat to 365 degrees.

Punch the dough down, divide in half and return one half to the refrigerator. Roll out the other half on a lightly floured work surface until dough is 1/8 -inch thick . Using a sharp knife, cut dough into 2-to-2 1/2 -inch squares. Immediately roll and cut the refrigerated dough. Do not allow the beignets to rise.

Starting with beignets you cut first, fry in batches 5 or 6 at a time, until golden brown, 1 to 2 minutes on each side. Drain on paper towels. Dust with confectioners' sugar and serve while still warm.

From "Joy of Cooking"

Nutrition informationPer serving: 118 calories, 5 grams fat, 1 grams saturated fat, 15 grams carbohydrates, 2 grams protein, trace fiber, 11 milligrams cholesterol, 46 milligrams sodium

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