We Pray for PEACE!

This month Cutlery Couture made a donation to the International Red Cross, in support of the Ukrainian people and their sovereignty. As the world watches in horror, we pray for families that are separated and suffering in this crisis, and we pray for peace. 

Maureen Dodson, a member of our Cutlery Couture team, shares her grandmother’s recipe for Pyrohy, brought to the US from Lviv, Ukraine more than a century ago. As with all recipes and food traditions passed down from generations, the meal is more than a meal, it is a recognition of culture, tradition of resilience and resolve:

Pyrohy was a part of every holiday feast growing up. Potato dumplings, also known as pierogi, were made in large batches assembly-style in our kitchen with aunts and cousins, hair covered with babushkas, the kitchen table covered with clean linen and a giant pot of salted water set to boil before we could get started. For me, they always taste like home. Like all my family’s recipes—there really is no recipe, but I managed to cobble this one from conversations with my aunts.

Make the filling:

• 5 lbs. of potatoes, peeled and quartered
• 8 oz cream cheese
• 3 -4 oz of any kind of cheese you have on hand, we always put some blue cheese in ours
• Butter and milk for mashing
• Salt and pepper

Make the dough:

• 2 ¼ C Flour
• 2 t salt and a little more
• 1 Beaten egg
• 2 T vegetable oil

Enough water to bind the dough—not too stiff, not too sticky

Pile flour and salt on a large wooden cutting board. Mix water, egg and oil and pour in center. Mix with your hands and knead the dough until it is smooth. Form the dough into several balls and put them in a large warm mixing bowl covered with a towel to rest for 20 minutes or so.

Prepare the onions:

• Chop 2-3 yellow onions

Melt 2 sticks butter and cook onions slowly, maybe 15 minutes so they are soft but not browned.

Set up an assembly line: 
Flour a work surface and role out the dough as thin as you can. Using the rim of a drinking glass dipped in flour begin cutting circles. Someone else then takes the circles and adds a spoonful of potatoes to center, crimping the edges together to make a half-moon dumpling. Wet your fingers if needed to make the dough stick. Drop into pot of boiling water by the batchful and cook for 3-5 minutes until they float. Remove with a slotted spoon and layer in pie plates with the cooked onions. If any pyrohy open, start fresh salted water boiling.

They are ready to eat or can be fried crisp.