the world's BEST pierogies
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I’m only 75% Italian. My mother’s mother’s side comes from Eastern Europe, are Slovak people, and - for generations and generations - have passed down this recipe for homemade bomb delish pierogies. I’ve been eating them my whole life and - without a doubt - they are the WORLD’S BEST PIEROGIES. Let’s go!
THE DOUGH
“Three, three, and three!” my mom says. Three cups of flour, three eggs, and 1/3 cup of cold water (makes 1 dough / 1 dough makes about 100 pierogies).
1. 3 cups flour in a bowl
2. Three eggs in a separate bowl and softly, lightly mix/whisk with fork - not scrambled, don’t beat
3. Put 1/3 water in the egg & stir lightly
4. Make well, hole in flour and pour in egg-water
5. Pull flour in from sides, like folding it in until it coagulates
6. Then you start squeezing and mashing with hands
7. Take out of bowl and knead on counter so the ‘wet’ inside works into the dryer outside, adding flour on counter surface as needed
8. Once a kneaded dough ball, wrap in plastic wrap and store in fridge
THE POTATO & CHEESE FILLING
supplies: giant pot, two 5lb bag of potatoes, salt
1. Peel 10 lbs. of potatoes!
2. Fill 1/3 of pot with cold water and plop peeled potatoes in so they don’t turn brown.
3. Cut potatoes in about inch-size pieces. Pieces have to be same size to cook evenly.
4. Drain potato water & rinse two times with fresh cold sink water.
5. Place fresh water potatoes on HIGH flame on the stove and SALT the water.
While potatoes are boiling, get next step ingredients ready:
ingredients:
two 8oz cream cheese
two 2% cottage cheese
two Farmer’s Cheese
salt & pepper
minimum two sticks of butter
supplies:
potato masher
big metal bowl
aluminum foil
plastic wrap
6. Boil potatoes until they are tender.
7. After you strain potatoes, return them to big pot.
8. Start with butter & get to mashin’!
9. Then cream cheese, then farmers cheese, then cottage cheese, then salt (if needed) and pepper.
10. When mixed and mashed, scoop out of pot into large metal bowl, cover with aluminum foil and store in fridge.
THE NEXT DAY ASSEMBLY
supplies & ingredients:
rolling pin, scooper, pierogi presses, butter knife, flour, doughs, potato filling
1. roll out dough (always mom’s job)
2. cookie-cut small circles of dough out (see process here)
3. place small dough circles in pierogi press, SQEEZE, knife off excess
4. flour and line up, careful not to touch pierogies together ( they may stick)
We’ve always done the pierogi assembly as a mini family pierogi party on my mom’s kitchen island and - as a team - we make an average of 200+ with a few doughs in a couple of hours.
Once you have what I’ve always called “an army of pierogis” you’re ready to get to cookin’ em. First step is to boil the little suckers.
TO BOIL THE PIEROGIES
1. Cold water in pot, bring to boil
2. Salt in water
3. Just boil dough a few seconds (less than a minute)
4. Strain out and dip in separate cold water
5. boiled ‘rogies go in a pan with Weston vegetable oil so they don’t stick
THEN, WHEN YOU’RE READY FOR A HELPING, you fry them up in a pan with a 1/4 inch of vegetable oil until golden brown. Remove them from the oil, pat dry with a paper towel, and serve them with a dollop of sour cream.
Man, I love this blog for giving me the space to write about this here. Before this, this recipe was living in the NOTES app of my iPhone, and we all know how that story ends. Glad this information is accessible and searchable and hopefully forever to be used by my future kids and their kids’ kids. Enjoy!
