The August 2010 Daring Cooks’ Challenge was hosted by LizG of Bits n’ Bites and Anula of Anula’s Kitchen. They chose to challenge Daring Cooks to make pierogi from scratch and an optional challenge to provide one filling that best represents their locale.
I decided to stick with a traditional potato and onion filled pierogi. Although super psyched to complete this challenge, I put it off until the last minute thinking that it was going to be a very involved, all day sort of recipe. I was pleasantly surprised by how quickly everything came together and how amazing the final result tasted.
For the filling, I started by preparing two cups of mashed potatoes (I cheated by using instant). To the mashed potatoes I added 1 tsp pepper, 1 tsp salt, and half of an onion chopped and sauteed in butter until just starting to brown.
I used my stand mixer to prepare the pasta dough. I placed two cups of flour in the mixing bowl, added one egg, 1 tsp salt, and slowly added about 1/2 cup water. I let the dough rest for about 30 minutes and then rolled it out super duper thin on a very well floured surface.
I then used a 3in circle cutter to cut the dough and placed 1 Tbsp of filling in the center. I don’t have any of the fancy pants pierogi molds, so I simply pinched the ends together with a fork until thoroughly sealed.
To cook the pierogi, I boiled the pasta until floating on the surface and then pan fried them in butter. They were perfect served with a trace of sour cream!
View the original challenge and results here!