Travel at home: making pierogi

So we can't travel - and it's been a long time since I was in Poland, which as you probably know is my favourite country. I want to take this moment to remind you that there is a war against the LGBT+ community currently happening in Poland, and it would be great for everyone to educate themselves about that here. It's so important to keep the conversation going. But today I wanted to bring a bit of travel back to the blog, because I really miss Poland and city breaks and cheap vodka - so I thought I'd make pierogi for the first time!

I've been banging on about doing this for ages, and my best friend got me some dumpling moulds for my birthday which are perfect for making pierogi - so I took myself to Morrisons, bought the ingredients and spent a Sunday making them from scratch for the first time ever. I mostly followed this pierogi recipe, so I'm not taking the credit, but here's what I used and how it went...

🇵🇱 241 grams of plain flour (I used Asda's own)
🇵🇱 1/2 tea spoon of table salt
🇵🇱 1 egg
🇵🇱 113 grams of soured cream (from the fajita aisle)
🇵🇱 57 grams of unsalted butter (room temp)

Firstly I mixed the flour and salt together, then added the egg followed by the soured cream and butter. This didn't take too long, and then I kneaded it which was horrible because as you can imagine, it's a very sticky dough. Eventually I felt like it was just about done so I covered it in clingfilm and put it in the fridge for a few hours while I went out for lunch.

I decided to experiment and fill & cook half the dough after 2-3 hours, and the rest of the dough after leaving it to prove overnight just to see if there was any difference. So I split the dough in two and started cooking some filling - my first option was quorn mince and onion, cooked in a bit of olive oil and herbs. After the filling was done I cut circles out of the dough, placed them on the dumpling moulds, added around 1 teaspoon of filling and folded them in half - the moulds seal and shape them for you, which is just amazing.

Then I popped them in some salted boiling water, and waited for them to float - this signifies they're cooked, and it only took a few minutes. You can eat them like that but it's much nicer to just sauté them in a bit of butter and let them go brown. Serve with some garlic sauce and a sprinkling of crispy onions and you've got a lovely little Polish dish.

For a first attempt, I think I did a really good job and I'm so excited to make them again, playing around with different fillings etc! Have you ever made pierogi? What filling would you go for?