Pierogi, perogi, pierogy, pierogi, pyrohy, pirogi, pyrogie, pyrogy. No matter how you spell it, those tasty little dumplings are heavenly. I LOVE THEM. Not as much as I love Sean, of course...but close.
My love of perogies is longstanding, notwithstanding that I have no genetic ties to Ukraine or Poland. Well, that's not true...I had one great grandmother who was Polish, but she was the mother of my maternal grandfather, and no recipes have come down the family line.
But, of course, I live in Alberta, and pretty much everyone in this province except for me is Ukrainian. And I (especially my taste buds) am thankful for that. Actually, I never realized how delightfully pervasive (if the word "pervasive" can have a
positive connotation) Ukrainian culture and food is in Alberta until my first grocery shopping trip when I moved to New Brunswick for law school. I remember being utterly confused and upset that I couldn't find frozen perogies. I ended up
finally finding some at Atlantic Superstore. They were sub-par, but I was desperate, so they got the job done while I was there.
When I moved back to Alberta, I was happy to come back to a wider variety of those little dumplings o' love, but the
best perogies around don't come from any store. They come from the kitchen of the house belonging to my mother's mother-in-law, Margaret (AKA my step-baba).
Now, my mama, sister-in-law, and I have been wanting to learn the family recipe for a long time, and this little list was a perfect excuse. We were all so thrilled that Margaret agreed to spend the day with us to guide us through it all.
We settled on a basic potato/cheddar/onion filling (
we didn't want to get ahead of ourselves, now), and so our day started with what I imagine every potato/cheddar/onion perogi-making day starts with: lots of potatoes. In our case, russet potatoes. Margaret has decades of trial and error under her belt, and she told us these were the best.
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| Russets: the best perogi taters! |
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| We scrubbed & peeled... |
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| ... then chopped 'em up |
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| And finally got them on the stove! |
After the potatoes were cooked, we added an embarrassing amount of cheddar cheese and chopped onions pan fried in a generous amount of butter.
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| Margaret shows the onions some love |
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| Hint for all you small-statured beauties: throw the bowl or pot in the sink to make it lower! |
We set the filling aside to cool and got started on the dough. Listen, filling is important, but in my view the key to an awesome perogi is the dough. It needs to fry up nicely, be a little bit chewy, and it can't be too thick... and Margaret's is
perfect.
The recipe is actually really basic: flour, water, egg, oil, and salt. The trick, though, is getting the feel for the dough, and letting it sit for just the right amount of time.
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| The beginnings of the wondrous dough... |
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| The dough before its requisite 20 minute rest |
Next was the assembly. Margaret told us that perogi pinching is a personal thing, and everyone has their own style: a straight seam, little ridges, etc. We were excited to see which way we pinched. Not gonna lie, the first few tries were rough...we had some wonky-shaped l'il dudes, and were happy just to get the damn things to stay sealed. But, after we got the hang of it, it was smooth sailing.
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| Gettin' in the groove |
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| Andrea lovin' up the dough |
Because we made so many perogies, we froze a whole bunch of them for later. To make sure they didn't stick together, we stacked single layers on tea towels and put them in the deep freeze. Once they were frozen (and no longer sticky), we transferred them to freezer bags.
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| Stacks of 'rogies! |
Of course, I can't leave out the fact that we couldn't resist having some of the fruits of our labour for supper that night. So, we walked to the grocery store, bought some sour cream, a Mundare sausage and some bacon, fried everything up, and devoured.
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| Gettin' ready for supper |
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| Mmmmm.... |
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RIGHT?!?!!
I am so happy I learned this family recipe. I can't wait to experiment with all kinds of fillings, and pass it on to my own kids one day.
Also, the day itself was so great. I love spending time with my family, and aside from the pictures here, the day was filled with all kinds of fun: my 9 year old nephew made $55 selling lemonade (seriously!), so he was in and out of the house making more batches, and my baby nephew was trrryyyying to crawl, but mostly sat happily in the kitchen playing with toys (when he wasn't sitting, he was passed around by all of us perogi-makers who needed our baby fixes!).
This 29-list item was definitely a success!
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