Pierogies- Vegan Mofo Day 7

Back when Cindy make the vanilla slice, we had a bit of a joint cooking event again, since it worked so well with out cake making. It's much easier and far more enjoyable to make time consuming, slightly difficult or just fiddly things with someone else. So while Cindy was concentrating on the vanilla slice, I was making pierogies with the help of Michael, Cindy and Toby.

We had already settled on making this recipe from Hell Yeah It's Vegan when Carla commented that we could also trial her recipe for a cookbook she is working on. So we decided to combine the two, we used Carla's topping which includes 'bacon' and also borrowed her idea to use dumpling/wanton wrappers as well as make the pierogie dough and filling from Hell Yeah it's vegan.

The dough unfortunately didn't work out. It was quite rubbery. We are not sure what went wrong but we started to figure something was up when we tried to cut the dough and couldn't get nearly enough circles to make pierogies and realised that the dough was extra tough.

They kind of looked ok from the outside when cooked though, this pic and the one below were taken with Cindy's camera:

So we moved onto using the dumpling wrappers, this worked particularly well and made us realise that it perhaps not worth the effort of making your own dough. I kind of sucked at closing the dumpling wrappers, but Cindy made loads or pretty ones. This batch was slightly burnt but nice and crispy.



Here they are with the delicious topping and some tofutti sour cream. The addition of the fake bacon in the topping was great and nicely balanced the pierogie filling and sour cream. The filling was nice and creamy, we used mashed potatoes instead of potato flakes and water and added more cheese and nooch than the recipe asked for but I'm sure that it made a great difference.

Pierogies

Yield: about 30 pierogies

Dough
2 c flour
½ tsp salt
¼ c soy margarine
3 tbsp water (more as needed)

Filling
2 c potato flakes
3 tbsp butter
2 c boiled water
3 tbsp vegan cheese, grated (I used cheddar)
1 tbsp nutritional yeast
1 tbsp vegan cream cheese, optional
salt
pepper

Topping and alternative dough

(from Carla's recipe)

To prepare the dough, sift together the flour and salt.

Cut in the margarine with a pastry blender or two knives. Add water and mix well. If more water is needed, add a tablespoon at a time, until the dough comes together in a ball. You don’t want it to be too wet.

Dust a clean surface with flour, and knead dough for 10 minutes. Place in an oiled, covered bowl in refrigerator for half an hour.

In the meantime, start working on the topping.

Next, prepare the filling. In a medium-sized bowl, add potato flakes, vegan cheese, butter, and cream cheese (if using). Add water and whip with a fork until all ingredients are incorporated; the butter and cheese should just melt evenly into the mixture. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Remove dough from refrigerator; divide into thirds. Roll each section into a ball. On a lightly-floured surface, roll one ball of dough out until it’s about 1/8″ thick.

With a round cookie cutter or a glass, cut into 2½-3″ circles of dough. (Keep the scraps–you can roll them out again later.)

Place a walnut-sized amount of filling in the center of each circle. Using your fingers and a small bowl of water, dampen the edges of the dough and fold dough in half, enclosing the filling.

Pinch edges with your fingers or a fork to seal.

Bring a large pot of water with a pinch of salt to a boil. Continue rolling out the rest of the dough until all dough and filling has been incorporated into pierogies.

Boil in rounds for about 3 minutes; they’re done when they float to the top. You can serve them immediately this way, or pan fry them until browned and crispy. Top with cabbage mixture and serve with sour cream.