Pierogi recipe and filling from my grandmother

I would love to make these for a gradation party for the family and surprise them.
However, can I use fresh strawberries and make them 5 days ahead of time and freeze them?
If so, when should I defrost? And, process after defrosting? Thank you, Carole

You can keep them chilled in the fridge for 5 days before using, easily. If you really want to freeze them, make sure you freeze them individually and uncooked (and keep them separate, don't put them together in a bag) then drop straight from frozen into boiling water, one by one. You should use fresh strawberries and serve with cream (in PL they use smietana, a bit like single cream and sour cream mized).

Most people here prefer the ones with blueberries - the strawberry ones tend to lose flavour during cooking.

try ricotta cheese

try the cheese called 'queso fresco'. it's a very dry cheese, but crumbles/grates well. works beautifully for pierogis. you should have no problem finding it in florida because it is favored by hispanics.

what i do is drang cottage cheese then let it dry for some time and then make the way my ma did

I have used Friendship all natural Farmer Cheese , website friendshipdairies.com
Friendship Dairies, LLC Friendship, NY 14739

This cheese has a soft consistency and is great for pierogies

I make sauerkraut pierogi for Christmas every year. I also make a farmers cheese filling that's a big hit. I use the farmers cheese that is firmer (as opposed to the cottage cheese texture), and grate it. Add 1 egg yolk, and a teaspoon of sugar and chopped raisins. When ready to eat, fry them in plain butter. The flavor is a great contract to the kraut. My family and friends love them.

There is only one recipe for authentic Ruskie Pierogi filling:

1. Sautee diced onions in oil until translucent
2. Add onions to an even amount of boiled potatoes and farmer's cheese
3. Add pepper and salt to taste

My favorite is stuffed with meat, I get an order of them every Saturday from a breakfast/lunch place in Montville Ct and they are not on the menu. Yula and Goisha serve them with homemade fried sauerkraut and a kielbasa that Kristoff has some butcher make for them (he wont tell me where he gets it).

My dad was the cook in our family. He used to saute saurkraut and bacon and stuff the pierogi's with that or he would stuff them with some cheese mixture, but never potatoes. My favorite were the ones stuffed with blueberry and sugar for dessert. Some of my fondest memories of my childhood were of clearing the kitchen table and putting the mound of flour on it and cracking the egg in the top like it's a volcano.

hi everyone i live in australia and my boyfriends mum use to make him pierogi so i would love to be able to try and make them for him but i have no idea what farmers cheese is or where to buy it or what i can use in place of it can anyone help me please

You can call local markets and ask for dry cottage cheese. My grandmothers as I are 100% polish and this is what we use. You add green onion, egg and a little sugar use this to fill the pierogie's. In the potatoe we also use green onion. You make them like you would mashed potatoes but don't add the cream and/or milk.

that is to wet to make pierogies

We don`t make pierogis at home today. You can buy tasty stuff in local corner shops, fresh delivery every day. The average cost - 15 zlotys per kilo.

Are they still hand made? The biggest company around "Supreme pierogi" claims the they form them manually. I can imagine their production line with older ladies telling stories. :-)

Yes, they are hand made. That is why they are still eatable. :):):)


On second thoughts.... Is it possible to produce pierogis on an assembly line?

Well, I know that there are pierogi (Somosa, Raviolli, etc.) machine manufacturers in North America. The machines are of various sizes: from family affair, to small restaurant use, to big production facility of frozen stuff.

When I said "assembly line" for hand-made pierogi it was a shortcut. I'd rather imagine a bunch of ladies standing around a big table in plastic caps and forming pierogi by hand. I saw such picture somewhere on TV.

Presumably they can be made by machine. Frozen pierogi plus the tens of thousands of fresh ones in Tesco, Carrefour etc round Christmas time certainly can't all be made by hand. Not at that price and quantity.

That;s how I imagine quilts being made :)

Or cross-stitched Battle of Grunwald, as shown here:
needleprint.blogspot.com/2012/02/we-can-do-bigger-stitchers-of.html

Feta is the same type of cheese, you can also mix in chedder for taste but you will need to fine grate.

and the reason why people still make them by hand is that they are so much more tasty than anything that can be mass produced, the process is impossible without additives, so get rolling stuffing and pinching the edges together, it takes time, but thats what happy families do together, kids love making them.

You can buy that Farmers Cheese by Friendship at Wegmans

Im so hungry now after reading this thread haha

Here's a recipe to make your own farmers cheese. To make the filling for pierogi, just add 1 large egg and 1-2 tablespoons sugar. Seems like a lot of work, but fresh is always better and truly a special meal

Farmers cheese

2 quarts pasteurized whole milk (do not use ultrapasteurized milk)
2 cups buttermilk
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt or to taste
Butter muslin or fine cheesecloth
Butcher's twine

In a heavy-bottomed pot, over low heat, slowly heat up the milk, stirring often, until it is just about to simmer (180 degrees

Stir buttermilk into heated milk. Then stir in the vinegar.

Turn off the heat and, very slowly, stir until the milk begins to separate into curds (solids) and whey (liquid). Leave undisturbed for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, wet the butter muslin or two layers of fine cheesecloth that is large enough to line a colander and hang over the sides. Place the muslin-lined colander over a bowl to catch any whey.

After the milk-buttermilk-vinegar mixture has sat undisturbed for 10 minutes, use a skimmer or slotted spoon to ladle the curds into the cheesecloth. Allow the curds to drain for 10 minutes.

Gather up the edges of the cheesecloth to form a bundle in order to drain as much whey as possible from the farmer's cheese.

Use a length of butcher's twine to tie the cheesecloth containing the curds into a neat bundle, pressing on the cheesecloth a bit to help the whey drain off.

Tie the string to a wooden spoon or dowel, and hang the cheese curds over a pot or container to collect any remaining whey and continue draining for 30 minutes

After draining, remove the cheese from the cheesecloth, and transfer it to a nonmetallic bowl or container.

Add salt to the farmer's cheese by stirring. This will break up the cheese into dry curds. You can form it into a solid piece by molding by hand, or leave it crumbly. Transfer to a nonmetallic container, cover and refrigerate. Use within 5 days.

thanks! I've made mozzarella before, this seems similar.

My Babci used farmers cheese, she would drain it in cheese cloth. She also filled them with krut and cabbage filling.

Merged: Buckwheat & farmer cheese pierogi

BUCKWHEAT & CHEESE PIEROGI FILLING (farsz pierogowy z kaszy i twarogu):
Swish 1 c buckwheat groats in bowl or pot of cold water and pour off any impurites that float up. Rinse groats in sieve under cold running water and drip dry. Place groats in saucepan with 1 t salt and 1.5 c boiling water, cover and cook on low heat until water is absorbed. Set aside covered to cool to room temp. Combine groats wtih 1 c fork-mashed farmer cheese and 1 finely minced onion browned in about 2 T oil. (Optional: one cooked fork-mashed potato may be added.) Combine ingredients, salt & pepper to taste and use to fill pierogi. Feel free to juggle ingredients according to preference the way our immigrant ancestors did. They cooked by feel, not according to recipes.

Provide sour cream with the cooked pierogi. These are great for Wigilia!

Pierogi's with Farmers Cheese and Onion.

My Aunt made the best pierogi's and the recipe I have is very faded and I can't make out the ingredients for the filling. I'm pretty sure it was Farmers Cheese and Onion. I've seen recipes using egg in the filling. Is that common? Also for the dough she didn't use egg either. Very simple ingredients. Flour, Water, Fat (Butter or Oil), Salt.

Yes but with potatoes as well

Exactly! The main ingredient in Polish cuisine.
And Irish too.
Poland is second Ireland.