Molly grew up in Chicago where there is a huge Polish population. She had tons of Polish friends and was always eating pierogi at food festivals and seeing them frozen in the grocery store, so Molly’s always been a fan of Polish culture and it was extra cool to learn that she is a little Polish!
| Level: | Intermediate |
| Total: | 3 hr 10 min |
| Active: | 2 hr 10 min |
| Yield: | 32 pierogies |
Ingredients
- 1 russet potato, baked and mashed
- 8 slices (about 10 ounces) thick-cut bacon, cooked until crisp and crumbled, with bacon fat reserved, divided
- 1 large white onion (360 grams/4 cups), finely diced
- 1 cup (240 grams) whole milk ricotta
- 2 tablespoons (12 grams) chopped chives
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 3 cups (390 grams) all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting and kneading
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 3/4 cup (180 grams) warm water
- 1/4 cup (60 grams) 2% Greek yogurt
- 1 large egg
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
- Reserved bacon fat
- Neutral oil, as needed, optional
- Reserved chopped bacon
- Reserved cooked onions
- Sour cream, for serving
- Chopped chives, for serving
- Flaky salt, optional, for serving
Instructions
- Preheat the oven or toaster oven to 350 degrees F.
- For the filling: Into a large mixing bowl, add the mashed potato and two-thirds of the crumbled bacon, reserving the remaining bacon for topping.
- In a large nonstick or cast-iron pan over medium heat, add a thin layer of the reserved bacon fat. Add the onions and cook until lightly browned, 10 to 12 minutes. Remove the onions from the pan and add half into the bowl with the potato and bacon, reserving the remaining onions for topping. Add the ricotta, chives, salt and pepper. Mix to thoroughly combine. Cover and refrigerate until you’re ready to make the pierogi. Keep the pan handy, as you’ll use it again.
- For the dough: In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour and salt. In another bowl or measuring cup, whisk together the warm water, yogurt and egg. Make a well in the center of the flour and pour in the wet mixture, then mix with a wooden spoon or with your hands to form a shaggy dough. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead for a few minutes until you have a smooth and soft dough that is slightly sticky. Wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.
- Prepare a baking sheet with a generous dusting of flour. Remove the potato filling from the refrigerator.
- To assemble the pierogi: Dust a clean work surface with flour. Working with a quarter of the dough at a time, roll out the dough to 1/8 inch thickness. With a 3-inch round cookie cutter, cut as many circles as you can (about 6 per quarter of dough after the first roll. The dough can be rerolled once to yield another 2, for 32 total.). Put a heaping tablespoon of filling in the center of each circle of dough, then pinch the edges to seal and pleat the seam. Once sealed, fold the edge over itself to crimp from one end to the other, pinching as you go. Place on the floured baking sheet while you assemble them all. At this point, you can cook the pierogi immediately or freeze them for up to 2 months.
- To cook the pierogi: Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Drop in several pierogi at a time and cook until the pierogi float, about 3 minutes.
- Heat the skillet over medium heat. Add enough reserved bacon fat to coat the bottom of the pan. Use a spider to drain the boiled pierogi as much as possible, then add them to the hot bacon fat and fry, in batches, for 2 to 3 minutes undisturbed on each side, or until lightly golden, adding more bacon fat, or neutral oil, if the pan gets too dry.
- Remove the fried pierogi to a serving platter or large, shallow serving bowl. Add the remaining half of the cooked onions and bacon to the pan and cook to reheat, 1 to 2 minutes. Transfer to the serving bowl. Top the pierogi with sour cream, chives, black pepper and flaky salt if desired.
Nutrition Facts
| Serving Size | 1 of 32 servings |
| Calories | 165 |
| Total Fat | 12 g |
| Saturated Fat | 4 g |
| Carbohydrates | 13 g |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Sugar | 1 g |
| Protein | 3 g |
| Cholesterol | 19 mg |
| Sodium | 138 mg |
Reviews
Being Polish myself, my Miranowicz family and I make several hundred pierogi weeks before Christmas. We freeze them and cook on Christmas Eve. From my mother that’s 80 years old, my Son, daughters and me all make our dough a bit different. What’s important is that we get together and celebrate our Polish heritage by enjoying delicious food. Looking forward to trying this recipe. A huge fan of Molly!
Recipe for dough was delicious. I’m on a quest to find a great recipe for dough. Unfortunately my Mom passed when I was a child and wasn’t recorded. I do my own thing for fillings. Was surprised with the ingredient of Greek yogurt. Recommend. Thank you Molly.
Yummy! Ignore rude comments and try this recipe! It is Molly‘s recipe and she can make it anyway she likes.
Molly, you may want to research the way you pronounce pierogi– being of Polish Descent and only 2nd generation American…pierogi is pronounced Pee-air-rogi and the R in rogi is rolled. You would also use Farmers cheese, not ricotti. Never had sauerkraut pancakes but potato pancakes are great, homemade and fried in oil. put a slice of raw white onion on it with homemade cold granny smith applesauce and you are living large. I do appreciate your easier to make pierogi dough. It is a challenge to get it right.
These were amazing. First time making pierogis but well worth the effort. I used leftover mashed potato from the day before and just added the ricotta, bacon, onions and I also added a little cheddar cheese. Other than that I followed the recipe. I did use a larger cutter because the 3 inch was too small to hold a Tbsp of filling and I didn’t want them to be all dough, not sure what I did wrong there…but even with the larger rounds I was able to make the 32 that were anticipated and still had dough leftover (but no more filling) The edges were not too thick or doughy.
Served with sour cream, bacon and the onions and they were devoured by the fam! If you have the time definitely give them a try.
Great recipe and super yummy, especially with the addition of bacon and ricotta in the filling. Takes time for all the components but totally worth it and love that I can batch make then freeze a bunch!
The perfect Polish pierogi! Their are different renditions to make the dough but the Greek yogurt adds a light aspect! Do not pay attention to the negative reviews below as this is a great recipe that’s delicious and POLISH! @polishphilcooks
These are NOT cheese pierogi!! These are potato cheese pierogi. Cheese pierogi are mad ed with sweetened farmer’s cheese. Molly has good recipes, but ghis is NOT one of them! And th he dough has sour cream in it, not greek yogurt. And her edges on the pierogi are way too thick! Stick to your midwest, Asian, and Jewish recipes. You know NOTHING about real Polish foid and recipes.
Preheat the oven to bake the potato??
Why is there an instruction to preheat the oven lol? This recipe doesn’t bake anything.