I used to make these often for potluck parties that I hosted myself - in Pittsburgh, where pierogi are so famous the baseball team has pierogi mascots race each other. [1] They’re a real crowd pleaser, the only hard part is that rolling and folding the dough thin enough requires the finger dexterity of an old babcia. (Polish grandma.)
So, unfortunately my pierogi often ended up being 2-3x thicker than the authentic ones from Poland.
Polish from Poland here: no need to roll them out thin. Might be a variation found in your family, but typical pierogi - including those made by my Grandma - have some fluff.
A different thing is how do you make the dough. I've recently been to a potluck organized by a Canadian friend as a token Polish person there and I've seen her look up recipes in which the recipes for dough were very creative - I've seen yoghurt, eggs, cream, butter etc. being added to it. Combine that with a sharp cheddar stuffing and I quickly got heartburn :)
The way we make dough is way simpler: 2:1 white flour and boiling hot water, nothing else. Some people might add eggs, but I never do. Mix roughly while it's hot, then knead really well, roll out, shape and boil in generously salted water till they float + 1 minute.
Now those "every single one is exactly the same" creates machine-made feel about them but some people don't care. Some are also using spoon or a fork to fold them, it's simpler and a middle ground between hand-made and "machine" made.
There's something weirdly universal about pierogi ruskie. I've not met anyone not liking them. Actually everyone I introduced to them loved the taste. (people usually try to look up polish delis / kitchens in the area that sell them afterwards) Given the simplicity of the ingredients, that's really impressive.
Sure, if you post on the internet that everyone seems to like X, there's surely going to be "that one person" somewhere. But over a larger number of people this still mostly holds.
Yep, sauerkraut + mushrooms are the most "traditional" and flavorful.
In the US, cheese and potato is pushed instead because it's cheap as fuck to produce. Basically they end up in supermarket shelves next to all the prepared foods that are 99% cheese and 1% meat at best.
Eh, much of the free carbohydrate content of sauerkraut has been eaten by the lactobacilli. All that gas that comes off it during fermentation doesn't smell much better than it would if you had fermented it in your colon instead, but at least it's happening at a slow rate and generally dissipates before being noticed.
Now, when I had kalua pork and (fresh) cabbage on vacation in Hawaii, it was delicious - but produced effects more like what concern you. For four days (!) I was a noxious chemical factory with a seemingly limitless ability to produce airborne products that probably would qualify as weapons under the Geneva conventions. Thank God we had rented a convertible, and I do feel sorry for those who were near us on the flight back.
It was at L&L, which apparently does have a significant presence on the mainland (though mostly West Coast) and a few non-US locations. Be cautious of that dish. I'm sure that if you ate it regularly, the effects would lessen (as they typically do for such things), but the adjustment period would greatly shrink your pool of people who want to be anywhere physically close to you.
Never noticed any ill effects from mushrooms, but I suppose we're all different.
I left Poland in 1983 and came back in 1992. Before we left, I had never had pierogi ruskie. If we had pierogi, they'd either be with fruit (strawberries or wild blueberries), sauerkraut and mushrooms or ground pork. That was pretty much it. We came back and ruskie were everywhere -- and rightly so.
This depends entirely on family traditions. My mother is from near the eastern border of Poland (Włodawa), my father from around Lublin, my wife from central Poland (Kutno).
Each family makes different versions of pierogi, even ruskie are different between the families. I (predictably) prefer the version that my mother makes, which has extra thin dough and slightly higher cheese to potato ratio, but all of them are good.
Other than ruskie I love pierogi z jagodami (with wild blueberries). They are the best summer food.
There's been an increase in some nasty parasite (can't remember which at the moment) among Poland's wild fox population. Foxes poop at wild blueberry bushes in the forests, and the parasites eggs get on the blueberries.
A parasite specialist quoted in the paper said that these eggs are so resilient they can survive boiling water or being baked in an owen. The parasite itself is a nasty one (e.g. will eat out your eye from inside if it lodges there). This convinced me to drop wild blueberry dishes I didn't prepare myself.
Yes, bąblowiec, I'm well aware. My sister is a vet. We always wash the blueberries after gathering because of that (and preferably you should gather berries after a strong rain). Also cooking the berries (like in the case of pierogi) might not help but I think usually will kill them? I've seen different opinions (even among doctors).
You can also get slightly different version of bąblowiec from dogs, and dogs touch EVERYTHING when they go on a walk, so basically if you're afraid about that you should deparasitize (is that a word in English?) the dog every year if you take your dogs for walks in nature (or visit places where lots of dogs poop - like dog parks).
In the end it's not that common (I mean it's common among foxes but not common among people - there's like few dozen cases a year in Poland AFAIR). Probably many more causes are never recognized because it develops very slowly but still - if it was easy to catch people would talk about it constantly.
The big controversy in my house is that my Polish grandmother made pierogi with rolled edges and we ate them fried (the edges were my favorite part), but when I married a Polish woman who went to cooking school in Poland she insists that she's never heard of doing it that way and she does it the correct way. She'll now make a few with rolled edges for me, but most without.
Well, as someone who is Polish, there is a headache even I've had to deal with. There are people in Poland who have only lived in the cities and are oblivious to the regional and even rural takes on food. Especially because there's areas that straddle between Polish/Germany, Polish/Belarussian, Polish/Ukranian and so on historical influences
And by headaches I mean I would bring some polish dish to a company potluck, two crazed never-saw-cows-in-a-field types would rant how it isn't polish and the one old timer Pole would tell them to shutup as they haven't stepped one foot outside Warsaw before coming to the US.
+1 from me, as article mention one of the small annoyances I have.
My family comes from Red Ruthenia, region where ruskie pierogi comes from. Because of lingual characteristic they are usually linked to Russia (as mentioned in article) and so, with all the turmoil many restaurants decided to rename them: either to pierogi with potatoes and cheese or to galicean - as from Galicia, which is commonly perceived as Krakow (due to it being center of the region).
Krakow doesn't have as good pierogis (but there are other things worth seeing and eating there though) and is half-the-Poland away so it feels to me somewhat like a takeover of a legacy and stings. So if you ever have a chance - go visit Lublin or even smaller cities like Chelm or Zamosc. Food is absolutely terrific there (which I guess is thanks to charnozem soil [1] in the region).
> My family comes from Red Ruthenia, region where ruskie pierogi comes from
Is there any definitive proof behind that? My family too come from former Polish territories in Ukraine.
It feels like in the last decade all of Slavs have been rushing into claiming as their own many traditions. I find it sad and unnecessary.
In fact I suspect the dish to be popular to move of the former Kievan Rus' region and I know for sure potato and cheese vareniki to be very popular in Belarus and western Russia.
There’s no more proof than any other dish. It’s so popular that no one bothered to have a “protected origin” certificate.
Yet they predominantly are served in this region so having them being “ruskie” or “ruthenian” (a huge region) is much more fair than naming it Galician.
Writing from the Ukrainian side of Galicia here, I would point out that Krakow is far from being the center of the region. Przemyśl or Zamosc lie much closer to the center if you include our side of Galicia where pierogis are widely popular as well.
Matter of fact my family and many others here cook and eat them every week on Sunday, which I now hold as a near and dear tradition. There is something special about rolling and folding the dough together, boiling the pierogis, cooking the mushroom/onion sauce.
Since this is a food cherished by both Poles and Ukrainians I find the name "galicean" a great fit as well, since it's a region shared between the two countries.
You're completely correct when it comes to geography. I made a mental shortcut, as Polish Galicia
Was concentrating around Krakow, which I suppose is an effect of a bias in which I’m not alone ;)
In such Zamość region is completely removed from “Galician cuisine” mentioning Jewish, Austria, Krakow and Ukraine. Weird omission (but many regional to Krakow dishes are described as “Galician” which I suppose is a reason.
So the misattribution risk is still there due to bias even though geographically it’s correct. I’d still rather preserve name, as the more to the west the worst the pierogi gets (which is a shame).
Whiting, Indiana has a Pierogi festival in the fall, that is pretty big. The local Ukrainian Church in my home town says:
"PIEROGIES, PYROHY, VARENYKY
(They're the best whatever you call them!)
at St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church
in Munster, Indiana!
You can purchase pierogies/pyrohy/varenyky every Friday from 12:00pm to 3:00pm in our hall at 8624 White Oak Ave, Munster, Indiana. We encourage to place your order early each week on the phone to ensure your order can be filled - extras may not be available for walk-ins."
They also have a festival just before Orthodox Easter... and we always go and load up on them, and the various breads and sausages that vendors offer.
Tradition here has potato pierogis fried in butter with a little bit of onions.
There is hardly any grain-cultivating population in the world that doesn’t have dumplings of some sort. Interestingly, however, the Romanian term colțunași is from Italian by way of Modern Greek, so it cannot be more than a few centuries old in Romanian. One therefore wonders what the earlier Romanian term for dumplings was, or whether dumplings were commonly eaten at all when the Vlach economy was still centered around transhumance.
I've eaten pierogi in Germany, Poland, Ukraine, and Russia, and the diversity and breadth of the dish makes them totally different than what you can find in Romania. I would say that colțunași are a subset of pierogi, since they're only filled with fresh cottage cheese filling and served only with sourcream (smântână). Also, I've encountered them only in the northern part of the country and nowhere else. So, I wouldn't say that we eat the same dish in Romania. Please let me know if you have found them in other parts of the country.
We have them in neighboring Slovakia too (not surprising), filling is mostly some potato+cheese paste (but you can end up with sweet ones with ie plums in some households).
The dough is pretty much tasteless, so depends what you fill into it and what you pour on it. Overall nothing comparable to say French fine cuisine but its a bit of our history since historically peasants ate these kind of things and meat was only for special occasions.
Pole here. For the lazy like me in the US: Kasias Pierogi from Costco are yum. Fry on a pan with Ghee till golden brown. Store frozen. Can be fried from frozen just fine. Quick and convenient.
Ever since I went to Stash Café in Montreal, I get Polish food wherever I can: https://restaurantstashcafe.ca/en/home-english. There is something about Polish food that feels like it's universally comforting to all who try it.
I can report that since the Russian invasion of Ukraine the Pierogi ruskie is now Pierogi ukraiński. Or at least they are in my Wife's hometown of Ustka on the North coast. According to the article this is a more accurate description anyway.
My wife's mother makes excellent pierogi. The potato ones are nice but the sauerkraut and mushroom are my favourite. A nice dollop of Heinz ketchup on the side. Delicious.
My mother in law is 2nd gen British, her parents came from Poland in the 1930s, so they are nearly 100 years out of Poland. It might be something to do with that.
Krowki are almost the same as fudge - depending on the recipe and shape those are usually indistinguishable.
But as per se they aren't very famous and are universally liked, so it's a safe thing to bring from Poland. Because ingredients are simple and mostly safe they also make a good gift for pregnant (assuming they want to munch on sugar-milk-butter candies, but who's to judge a sweet-tooth?).
I agree that krówki are rather little known outside Poland and the GP’s post was daft. But I was amused to find krówki from Poland sold in several towns in Chilean Patagonia, which I guess is a testament to modern shipping-container based trade.
Not true, they’re popular all over Eastern Europe. So much so that the Krowka brand is available at nearly every Russian/Armanian/etc store in the US. It’s a staple in the candy isle along with mishka, belochka, and Alenka.
Those stores probably outnumber the restaurants serving pierogi significantly.
Not internationally. At least in the US. I've never heard of krowki, but having lived in Wisconsin and the Chicago area (which both have a large number of people with Polish heritage) Pierogi are a common bar food.
There's an interesting shift in language associated with the Russian invasion of Ukraine - a type of pierogi which used to be called ruskie (from the region of Red Rus, where they originate) are now commonly named ukraińskie (Ukrainian) instead.
The reason is that the adjective ruskie is typically understood as "Russian" in general parlance.
Even the Ukrainian state’s non-recognition of the Rusyn people isn’t so simple: in Slovakia you can meet minority East Slavic speakers who insist that what they speak is “Ukrainian” (when it’s obviously not), and that “Rusyn” is a weird label outsiders keep trying to pin on them.
There is a long history of states denying and repressing the Rusyn identity. I’m sure many modern people aren’t bothered to learn their history and just adopt whatever label has been given to them. It’s not significantly different from any other minority group that has been subsumed into a larger group.
There are historical cultural differences between the groups as well. Lemkos, for example, are Greek Catholics, which is a minority group in Ukraine and has a different history (tracing themselves to Croats.)
Which villages does your family descend from specifically? Although it wouldn’t be surprising if a person of Rusyn descent has never heard of this, since one of the most frequent remarks in histories of the Rusyn people is that the identity has sometimes flourished more in the diaspora than in situ.
My experience is from mid 2019 in communities around Medzilaborce where I was collecting microtoponymic data. I was obviously inclined to think of this minority East Slavic material as Rusyn, but my informants insisted that it was “Ukrainian”. Considering that these communities have produced figures who went on to be famous in wider “Ukrainian” movements, it is no surprise that the two ethnonyms have competed in that region.
EDIT: So I went searching to read more about this using "Čertižné" (one of the supposedly “Ukrainian” villages) as a search term. In this essay[0] where a writer of Čertižné descent is mostly busy criticizing Timothy Snyder, he briefly sketches the phenomenon I witnessed:
"The end of WW2 saw the annexation of Subcarpathian Rus’, renamed Transcarpathia, into the USSR. To legitimize seizure of this territory, Stalin brought the debate over the ethnic identity to a close and deemed all Rusyns Ukrainian. Rusyn became a bourgeoise term placed outside of law and all those who identified as such were now forcefully Ukrainianized. Some Rusyns in Czechoslovakia, given the choice of complete assimilation or at least a partial preservation of their culture, accepted the Ukrainian label. For example, the current director of the Rusyn Museum in Prešov, Ľuba Kráľová, identified as a Ukrainian during the communist regime even though she doesn’t speak Ukrainian. Other Rusyns felt closer to the Slovak ethnic identity than to the Ukrainian one."
I was born in Humenne but my grandparents are from along Cirocha river to the east.
There's many flavors to rusyns/ruthenians, they can't even agree on the same language so it's possible that they don't relate to other rusyns or they are afraid to admit they are rusyns because they used to be oppressed for it in the past.
If you understand the language I recommend the website rusyn.sk, especially the jokes[0], they are a bit different flavor, sometimes not politically correct and my friends love it.
PS: looking for the link to the jokes I found [1] that specifically talks about rusyn vs ukrainian identity - it's in standard Slovak language so google translate should deal with it fine if you can't read Slovak.
Both me and the other poster in this thread have posted links on the overlap between Rusyn and Ukranian identities in Eastern Slovakia. The Magyar identity is centered around the Hungarian language and Roman Catholicism or Protestantism, while any history of the Rusyn people will emphasize how they are East Slavic-speaking Greek Catholics, so why you feel that the Magyars are relevant here is beyond me. Some of the Rusyn-speaking world was under Austrian administration in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, so they weren’t even under Hungarians politically.
No, not to any significant extent. I speak Hungarian and have very frequently passed through that small part of Transcarpathia where Hungarian is still spoken, and I have rarely encountered an ethnic Slav who learned Hungarian to proficiency. The language of interethnic communication in Transcarpatia was generally Russian during the Soviet era, and even remained such into the post-Soviet era, though Ukrainian has naturally gained ground.
And again, most of the Rusyn population in Ukraine is living far enough to the north or northeast that they have no contact whatsoever with the Hungarian language. I don’t think you have any actual knowledge of this part of the world.
Yeah my wife’s granddad was stationed in a Ukrainian village as a doctor and had to learn some Hungarian to communicate with locals, so… Let’s fight who anecdotes are better.
> they have no contact whatsoever with the Hungarian language.
Yet loads of them pass Hungarian nationality test which involves speaking Hungarian.
Again, the Hungarian-speaking part of Transcarpatia is a fairly small area, see the convenient map[0] on Wikipedia. Most Rusyns in Ukraine live to the north or northeast of that small area in green. These are statistics that you can consult for yourself, no need for anecdotal evidence. Congratulations, your wife’s granddad must have got stationed in one of those very few communities in Transcarpatia where Hungarian is spoken. That means nothing for categorizing a people spread over Ukraine, Slovakia, and Poland as “akin to Magyars”.
You do realize that the vast majority of people from Ukraine passing the Hungarian nationality test are ethnic Hungarians, not Rusyns?
Indeed. “Rus” is an ethnonym, of famously Scandinavian origin, used across the entire East Slavic area and was never something limited to people in now-Ukraine that people in now-Russia could “steal”. The Uralic- and Turkic-speaking peoples of the Middle Volga, for example, already called the neighboring Slavic-speaking populations “Rus” in the medieval era.
Actually no. "Rus" was meant to describe "all" East Slavic people, but Russians took it for themselves "only" and started to call Ukrainians "Little Russians" in sense of "Lesser Russians".
While what you say is true, it is irrelevant in the context of the discussion here about the popular misunderstanding of pierogi ruskie. This confusion is due to multiple factors than just “Russia stole”, including that the Ukrainian-language literary canon is centered around “Ukrainian” as the ethnonym, instead of making any attempt to preserve or revive the ethnonym “Rus”. While some Rusyns did maintain the ethnonym, other Rusyn speakers have preferred to identify with another ethnonym instead. If East Slavs other than Russians and Belarussians did not stand up for the ethnonym en masse, no surprise that peoples elsewhere no longer have the ability to distinguish.
And there is reason why they focus on "Ukrainian" (borderland etymologically btw) instead of "Russian" or even "Little Russian". The therm "Little Rus" was first used for Kyiv in sense of it being the center of Rus - Rus proper and "Greater Rus" meant the wider area of their influence. Russians (as we know them today) managed to turn this around and made it a derogatory term.
Even more - the "Rus" became first to mean "Slavic Orthodox faith follower" and it covered multiple nations, even non-Slavic ones. The fact that Russians call themselves now by this name is not an accident.
Again, what you say is true, but irrelevant in the context of this discussion thread. You look like you are searching for reasons to get upset, and you ought to calm down, take a deep breath, and consider that some of your interlocutors here are not your enemies.
You copy/pasted the same text in the reply to me as you did to another user in this thread. Please don’t do this, it is considered poor form on HN.
> My comments try to explain why Ukrainians believe that Russians have stolen the "Rus" identity (from them) only for themselves.
Which is completely irrelevant to the thread. And, let’s be honest, is of little interest to anyone. This cultural appropriation bullshit has gotten old a long time ago already.
It is completely relevant to the thread about Russia stealing Ukrainian "Rus" identity. This is not some European Americans dressing up like Native Americans "this is a cultural Appropriation" bullshit. This is the real thing where a national entity denies existence of another nation and is in process to genocide this nation while pretending to be historically the same nation they are attempting to genocide. Of course there are other forces in play, but this in one of the main themes from the very beginning. Of course it is more comfortable to downplay this by calling it old and irrelevant than do something about it.
But it is clear that Polish pierogi ruskie can't be Russian dumplings because Russian dumplings are pelmeni that are dumplings with meat. But the origin of these dumplings is not Russian either, as the word comes from the Udmurt language.
Old name with a very specific meaning. The therm "Little Rus" was first used for Kyiv in sense of it being the center of Rus - Rus proper and "Greater Rus" meant the wider area of their influence. Russians (as we know them today) managed to turn this around and made it a derogatory term.
I don't quite agree here, but what they do then is conflate words "Russian and Rusian" to mean the same thing, claiming for various stuff their population has no relation to. It's a dirty tactics very in-line with their today's propaganda machine.
I don't understand what's controversial about this. "Rus" is the medieval East Slavic society.
Three of the four modern East Slavic cultures retain the word root in the name (Russians, Belarusians, Rusyns). One of them uses the expression "borderlands" for their identity (Ukrainians).
You then obviously don't know the history. One notable thing to mention is that Russia started as Principality of Moscow, a vassal state to Mongols, a collector of tribute for Mongols. Taking their own share from this tribute allowed them to prosper.
I have been in Poland for much of the time since the war started, and while I have read news articles about this supposed new term pierogie ukraińskie, I don’t think I have ever seen it in the real world. The pierogis served at milk bars, or from Żabka to be microwaved, are still overwhelmingly referred to as ruskie. Even the Ukrainian cafe nearby serves them as pierogie ruskie.
Plenty of milk bars call them ukrainskie. Especially ones in Praga.
I’ve also noticed “pierogi kresowe” which is a reference to Kresy, a historical Polish region that includes Ruthenia, the origin of pierogi ruskie. I don’t recall ever seeing these before, so my guess is that the pierogi industry decided that Kresowe was a less controversial name to use.
I've had varenky in Ukraine and they are subtly different than pierogi ruskie. But then again the filling is also slightly different from family to family, so maybe that's the reason.
I've seen them and was at first confused as to what they were, especially that Ukrainian borscht is very different from the local version, so I assumed it was something new.
That only happened in the first few weeks/months following the invasion, and since then people returned to calling them "Ruskie". The general consensus is that the name refers to the historical area of Ruthenia
I no longer live there, but when I visit now, I often see the name "Kresowe" having replaced "Ruskie", Kresy being the name of a historical region around the Polish/Ukrainian border.
My friend told me "ruskie" is used as a somewhat pejorative description of a "Russian". Like Brits say "Yanks" about the Americans.
The other issue is that people don't know how to translate "ruski" to English, so they would say "Russian dumplings", but in reality they should be called "Ruthenian dumplings" from Ruthenian Voivodeship.
They probably seen tourists turn their nose on "Russian dumplings", so they renamed them to "Ukrainian".
Since most of the Ruthenian Voivodeship is now in Ukraine it somewhat makes sense, but it is not entirely correct. Just shows lazy thinking.
In the UK, those sold in supermarkets are no longer called "ruskie" but simply potato and cheese dumplings.
When it's used as a noun it's pejorative for Russian people. When it's used as an adjective - it's neutral (and can be used both for russian and ruthenian stuff).
There's also more specific words - rosyjskie for russian and rusińskie for ruthenian, but very few people use "rusińskie" nowadays.
BTW there's this joke from communist times:
A waitress in a milk bar shouts "who ordered ruskie", someone in the bar shouts back "nobody, they came on their own".
> My friend told me "ruskie" is used as a somewhat pejorative description of a "Russian". Like Brits say "Yanks" about the Americans.
There was a joke which used that, during the Communist Poland era (where country was thoroughly dominated by it's USSR neighbor and supposed friend, as per the official propaganda):
Sorry but no. Live here and eat pierogi few times a week. Still calling them ruskie, and people are just as indifferent to that name as they have always been.
The subject has popped up here and there. But more as a whimsical joke amongst people around me with more of an intelligentsia background.
There are however, many new places with Ukrainian pelmieni opening up everywhere you look. But that’s a separate thing.
I'm not sure if it's a shift in language - it's more like a reaction/virtue signalling of some restaurants in the first weeks of invasion that briefly got viral, but - in the rare case of accuracy winning over memes - it died out as people soon after (re)learned that "ruskie" in "pierogi ruskie" refers to Ruś, not Russia. At least, that's my local experience (Kraków, Poland) - we went through the meme phase and came out of it a week or two later, and I haven't heard anyone mentioning "ukraińskie pierogi" ever since (until on HN, today).
>The reason is that the adjective ruskie is typically understood as "Russian" in general parlance
I’m not a native speaker, but I always heard that the Greek derived Rosyjski/Rosjanin/Rosjanka were for Russians (ie the ethnic majority in the Russian Federation) but Ruskie was still reserved for the Rus’ in general.
I’ve had native speaking members explain the distinction to me, that ruskie is more of a catch-all term for the Rus’ peoples. Then again, my family hails from northeast and southeast Poland near the borders with the Rus’.
"Ruskie" vs "Rosyjskie" is a difference between common speech and more proper grammar, but in regular usage of the language they both mean the adjective "Russian". I'm native.
So, unfortunately my pierogi often ended up being 2-3x thicker than the authentic ones from Poland.
1. https://youtu.be/6w5MDNjg9zU