Yum! How long has it been since I've had Pierogi?!
When I was a little girl my Polish grandma would come to visit and we would have pierogi marathons.
All day pierogi making followed by all evening pierogi eating. Then we would freeze the hundreds of pierogies for future consumption. We always made potato cheese and we always made a delicious sauce with sauteed onion and sour cream.
Well...since going Gluten, cow dairy, soy and egg free I haven't had a pierogi. So it's more than 5 years and probably a lot more than that. After making ravioli and then looking at these giant Organic potatoes that arrived in my organic box, I was inspired.
Pierogi are pretty simple. You just need a good gluten free pasta dough mix and the rest is easy. I, again, used the schar brand flour mix for pasta and instead of egg I used xanthan gum. About a quarter of a teaspoon for each 80 gm of pasta flour and a sprinkle of agar agar just for kicks.
I used 400gm of flour, 1 1/4 teaspoon of xanthan plus the sprinkle of agar agar, about 5 spoons of oil and 1 1/2 cups of water all into the food processor and mix. Then added in very slowly water until it started to mix well. I had to push the flour down a bit with a spatula. You can add flour back in until it forms a ball. At this point I put it on a well floured surface and kneaded it with more flour until it lost the stickiness. Cover with plastic wrap so it doesn't dry out while you prepare the filling.
Meanwhile, you can peel and cut up your potatoes and add them to boiling water. Cook until soft, drain and cool.
Here I've added some salt and pepper.
Next sauté a large onion in olive oil or butter. When they are soft and translucent they are done.
Add them to the potatoes and mix! Not too much or they turn to glue! Just enough to get the lumps out.
Make sure the potato and onions are cool and add in some grated cheese. I used pecorino. Pure sheep cheese. I used a soft young pecorino. The hardest ones might be too flavorful for this recipe. Taste the filling and see if you like it. Add salt and pepper as you like.
Next I rolled out my dough, half at a time, with my trusty white wine bottle that we will probably never drink. Someone brought it to a party here once. We are red wine drinkers but when it comes to white, I only drink the ones with bubbles!
Some tools: a lid to one of those giant 52oz coconut oil containers. Small bowls or large mugs will work just fine. Search around your kitchen and you will most likely find something that is the right size. Otherwise you can just make them any size you want. I like 'em big!
I prepared a little bowl of water with a brush to help seal the dough. I thought I would need that fork up there to seal like I did with the ravioli but it just came naturally to use my fingers. I must have been channeling my late grandma. Using your fingers looks like what they are supposed to look like.
This is a little too much filling but try to get as much as you can in. I had to take some out after this picture.
Thank you husband for stepping in to take pictures!
Fold over and press down the sides until they stick.
And try not to use too much water. It might do the opposite and I found out.
This is how much my 400grams of flour made. My three large potatoes left a lot more filling than was needed.
I packed up the Pierogies that I won't be using right away in freezer bags for single time use and put them in the freezer. I'm happy that I have some easy meals ready to go...We don't stay at home much when the weather is nice so it is impossible to cook something good in such short amounts of time. We usually get home right at dinner time(8pm) or even later.
Now for the sauce. The color of these photographs has changed to night time yellow!
Cut an onion in half and slice it up into thin strips. Saute with oil or butter until browned.
Add salt and pepper and then mix it in Sour cream if you can, otherwise do what I did. Pure goat milk greek yogurt. It's thick and creamy like sour cream.
Boil a large pot of water and drop in your pierogi. They float when they are cooked. After taking them out of the water fry them a little on each side in a pan with oil or butter. They should be golden brown.
I probably could have cooked these a little longer in the pan to get them a little more brown but they were good anyway.
Dollup the onion-yogurt mixture on your Pierogi and eat.
Don't forget to eat something green! These are heavy!
I made some bietole, which is...chard...thank you wikipedia, sauteed with garlic. There were more, I just ate them before I took the picture! ha!
