Luxembourg-inspired Pierogi

I love cookbooks, in fact, I am the proud owner of an ever-expanding library of cookbooks. So, when I got invited to the ‘Eating Greens’ cookbook launch in Brussels, I had to go! The book is a compilation of 50 recipes provided by Green MEPs, so the recipes are very international and varied.

Our Luxembourg Green MEP, Tilly Metz, has contributed a recipe for Pierogi. These Polish stuffed dumplings don’t seem very much related to Luxembourg at first… but Tilly explains in the book that the recipe comes from a Polish friend of hers, who cooked them for her, and that she has fallen in love with the dish since. What’s great about pierogi is that you can fill them with anything you have at hand, and leftovers can easily be used up in these dumplings.

Tilly’s pierogi are filled with mushrooms and sauerkaut – a typical Polish filling, known as pierogi z grzybami i kapustą kiszoną. For my version, I’ve decided to add a Luxembourg-inspired filling. I’m using broad beans with Bounekräitchen (summer savory – a herb that tastes like a mix of thyme and oregano). Gaardebounen, as we call these beans, are a typical side for a traditional Luxembourgish dish Judd mat Gaardebounen – smoked pork with creamy broad beans cooked with summer savory.

So, these vegetarian pierogi have a Luxembourgish-flavoured filling, and they get finished off with some buttery onions, dollops of sour cream, a bit of fresh dill and chopped gherkins (!) – and if I may say so myself, this tastes amazing! I hope you’ll agree.

If you’re interested in the recipes in ‘Eating Greens’, you can win a copy of the cookbook here – and you’ll automatically get a free PDF version to download after you enter your email.

This post was sponsored by The Greens / EFA in the European parliament in order to promote their cookbook.

Ingredients

For the dough:
250g flour (T55)
150ml lukewarm water
½ tsp salt

For the filling:
½ onion
15g butter
1 small garlic clove
1 tsp Bounekräitchen (summer savory)
150g frozen broad beans
1 tbsp sour cream
A bit of lemon zest
Salt and pepper

For the topping:
1 onion
50g butter
2 gherkins
4 tbsp sour cream
A bit of dill

Method

Serves 2

Start by making the dough: put the flour, salt and water in a bowl and start kneading with the hook attachment of a free-standing mixer. Knead for 5 mins until smooth. Cover and leave to rest for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the filling:
Peel and finely chop the onion. Melt the butter in a frying pan and fry the onions with a pinch of salt for 4 minutes. Peel and crush the garlic clove and add to the onion with the Bounekräitchen – fry for another minute. Set aside.

Cook the broad beans in salted water for 5 minutes until soft. Drain and cool under a running tap. Put the cooked broad beans in a blender with the fried onions, sour cream, a bit of freshly grated lemon zest and salt and pepper. Blend to a paste.

For the topping: Peel and slice the onion. Melt 30g butter in the frying pan used for the onions earlier, and fry the onion slices with a pinch of salt for 10 minutes until really soft. Set aside in the pan.

Chop the gherkins into cubes and put in a small bowl. Chop the dill and put in a small bowl.

Roll out the dough on a floured surface. Cut our circles of 7cm. Place a teaspoon of filling on a dough disc and lightly moisten the edges with water. Fold the dough over and press firmly on the edges to seal. Press again with a fork to seal.

Cook the pierogi in boiling salted water for 2-3 minutes until they float to the surface. Remove with a slotted spoon and put into a bowl.

Put the pan with the fried onions back over a medium heat and add the remaining 20g butter. Once melted, stir though the pierogi.

Distribute the pierogi between 2 plates. Serve each portion with a dollop of sour cream and sprinkle with gherkins and dill.