How to Make Homemade Pierogi

I recently tried my hand at making homemade pierogi. For those who don't know what pierogi are, they're a Slovankian/Polish dumpling usually stuffed with potato, sauerkraut, or cheese, or some combination (and usually fried onion). You boil them and eat them with LOTS of butter.

You can buy them frozen, but nothing compares to homemade! Since we love them so much and eat them abundantly during Lent, I figured it was my turn to learn.

I used this recipe:

Dough:
3 eggs
1 8 oz. container of sour cream
3 cups AP flour
1/4 t salt
1 T baking powder

Potato Filling:
3 T butter
1/2 cup chopped onion
2 cups cold mashed potatoes
1 t salt (I omitted this because my mashed potatoes are salted already)
1 t white pepper

I cooked up my mashed potatoes and quickly refrigerated them. It'd be easier to make them the night before, which I plan to do next time.


Then I made the dough. First, I sifted together the dry ingredients, and then beat the eggs and sour cream. I gradually added the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients until the dough was formed. I floured my table and kneaded the dough for a bit, and then rolled it out to about 1/4 inch thickness.

This turned out to be a bit thick for our tastes, so next time I'll try thinner. But I'm not that experienced with dough, so I was being careful!


Next, I used a 3-inch cup to cut out the pierogi circles. It worked just fine, considering I didn't have a cookie or biscuit cutter!


After these were all cut out, I took out my potato filling from the fridge and sat a little spoonful of it on each pierogi center. Then, I wet the edges of the pierogi and folded it over. I pressed the edges together firmly - you can also do a little twist on the edges to keep it together, if you're good at that.


I stood for a pause to admire how pretty they'd gotten. Not bad for the first time!


After they're all ready, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Put a few pierogi in the water at a time, careful not to boil too rapidly, and to be very very gentle when stirring so you don't rip them. It just takes about five minutes, and they'll be floating, letting you know they're done!

Just use a slotted spoon to scoop them out, delicately.


Serve with butter!

The verdict: they came out absolutely heavenly. Almost perfect, and almost just like the best pierogi we've ever eaten, which are handmade at a Polish Catholic church near us during Lent. Rolling the dough a bit thinner and adding a little cheese to the filling would make them perfection.

This post is linked up with Tasty Tuesday and Tempt My Tummy Tuesday.