Recipes with pies

No other cuisine in the world has such a variety of pies, as the Russian one. Even the Russian word pirog derives from the old Russian pir - a holiday

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No other cuisine in the world has such a variety of pies, as the Russian one. Even the Russian word "pirog" derives from the old Russian "pir" - a holiday. Even today a pie is more like a holiday dish, than an everyday one. However, unfortunately, we now mostly make pies with cabbage, rice, meat and sweet fillings, or even use semi-finished foods. In fact, there used to be a great variety of pies in Russia. A rasstegai – a round open pie the size of a plate, a kulebyaka – a pies with plenty of filling, a kurnik – a wedding puff pie and many, many others. They were filled with meat, fish, poultry, brains, eggs, cottage cheese, peas, various porridges, turnips, onions, potatoes, carrots, mushrooms, sorrels, apples, berries and even pickled gherkins. Today we shall try to refill this annoying gap and bring to your attention the tastiest recipes for Russian pies.

Siberian Fish Pie

1.5-2kg leavened pastry
1.5kg fresh fish (preferably: white salmon, muksun, sterlet, sturgeon, trout, large pike (a remarkable pie!), burbot)
4-5 onions
bay leaves
ground black pepper

Clean the fish (if sturgeon or sterlet only remove crust horns), gut, remove head and tail, half-cut along the spine to form a rectangular). If the fish is very big, you can make more cuts along the spine from both sides of the first cut. Put it on a big dish, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and leave for 30 minutes. Slice onions finely (you need a lot of onions to make the fish juicier). Divide the prepared pastry in two parts and make a rectangular to fit your baking tray. Put the first pastry layer on the buttered tray, sprinkle evenly with half the onions. Put the fish on the onions, top with 2 bay leaves, and sprinkle evenly with the rest of the onions. Cover with the second layer of pastry and carefully pinch the layers together. Make a small hole in the middle of the pie to let out the steam and keep in the juice. Bake in the pre-heated oven.

Cowberry Pie

pastry:
100g butter or margarine
2 tbsp sugar
vanillin
1 1/2 cups flour
1 egg
filling:
1 cup cowberries
1 1/2 tbsp potato starch
1/2 cup sugar
3-4 medium-sized apples

Cooking:
Make short pastry and leave it for 30 minutes in a cold place. Roll out a small flatbread and put it in a split form. Roll a rope from the other pastry and make the edge on the top. Bake in a hot oven until it just starts getting brown. Rinse cowberries. Combine them with sugar and starch and put them on the pie. Sprinkle with thin slices of apples, sugar and cinnamon, and bake 10-15 minutes at medium heat.

Sauerkraut And Bacon Pie

(serves 4)
250g flour
20g yeast
125ml milk
1 pinch sugar
50g butter
2 onions
400g turkey
200g smoked bacon with streaks of meat
1 apple
1 pod red sweet pepper
2 tbsp thyme
520g sauerkraut
250g sour cream
3 eggs

Cooking:
Make pastry from flour, yeast, milk, sugar, salt and butter. Cover and leave in a warm place until it doubles in volume. Peel and slice onions. Cut turkey in small slices. Cut the bacon in cubes and fry it. Add turkey and onions and fry more. Cut an apple in segments. Cut sweet peppers in cubes. Add both to the turkey and stew a little. Add thyme, sauerkraut and seasonings. Brush the baking tray with fat and roll out pastry on it. Put the sauerkraut filling on it. Combine eggs with sour cream and spices, and pour over the sauerkraut. Bake 30 minutes at 200 C.

Burbot Pie

(serves 10)
for filling:
300g burbot fillet
150g butter
1 shallot
1 tbsp sunflower oil
100g fresh fish cartilages
50g rice
150g stellate sturgeon or sturgeon
for pastry:
250g wheat flour
1/5 stick fresh yeast
0.5 tsp sugar
3 tbsp sunflower oil
0.5 tsp salt

Cooking:
Slice burbot fillet finely, add 100g butter. Fry onions in sunflower oil, combine with burbot, simmer until ready. Cook and chill rice. Cook 100g fish cartilages without salt until soft and cut. Combine everything in a saucepan, add 50g butter, and stir. Slice stellate sturgeon or sturgeon and boil it. Dissolve yeast in a cup of warm water, add sugar. Make pastry from the ingredients and let it rise. Butter a baking tray. Roll out pastry thin and the size of the baking tray. Put the filling on the pastry, and the boiled fish on it. Decorate with a pastry grid. Leave the pie to rest 15 minutes, brush with egg, and bake at 180-200 C 20-25 minutes until ready.

Fish Kulebyaka

250g flour
20g yeast
50g butter
1 cup milk
1/2 tbsp sugar
1 egg salt
1 yolk
150g fat fish fillet
250g pikeperch fillet
1 tbsp sour cream, sunflower oil and breadcrumbs
1 egg
50ml milk
1 onion
salt, pepper
for filling:
100g rice
1 1/2 cups water
1 tbsp butter
salt
Dissolve yeast in milk and add half the flour. Knead, cover and leave in a warm place for 30 minutes. Then knead again, add butter, egg, sugar, salt and flour. Knead, cover and leave in a warm place for 40 minutes. Boil rice in boiling salted water 15-20 minutes. Chill it and put in a buttered form. Cook in the oven 20-30 min at 200 C. Hard-boil an egg, and cut it finely. Grind pikeperch fillet and onions twice in a meat grinder. Add butter, egg, breadcrumbs, sour cream, milk, salt, pepper, and stir. Slice the fillet of fat fish. Divide the pastry into 4 parts and roll out into oval flatbreads 1 cm thick. Put the layers of ground fish, rice, slices of fish fillet, and again ground fish and rice. Turn up the edges and pinch them above the filling. Cover with a napkin and leave in a warm place for 15 minutes. Brush the kulebyaka with yolk and puncture with a fork. Bake 40 min at 220 C.

Mushroom Pie

400g flour
200g margarine
200g kefir
1 tsp drinking soda
salt
125g dry mushrooms
50g onions
ground black pepper

Heat margarine about 1 minute in a microwave at top heat. Combine melted margarine with kefir, and, knead pastry carefully adding flour and soda little by little. Leave to rest about one hour. Soak dry mushrooms in warm water for 1.5 hours, chop them finely and combine with chopped onions. Add salt and pepper. Simmer the mix of mushrooms and onions in a little water. Roll out pastry and put it a round form. Make edges on the sides. Put the filling evenly and sprinkle with spring onions. Bake until ready. Then leave the pie to rest 10-15 min.

Troitsk Pie

3.5 cups flour
20g yeast
2 tbsp sunflower oil
For filling:
boiled mushrooms
1 tbsp fried onions
1 tbsp flour dissolved in cold mushroom broth
salt, pepper, nutmeg
fresh parsley or dill

Cooking:
Knead dense pastry from 3.5 cups of flour, 20g yeast dissolved in warm water, and the necessary amount of water. Leave to rest, add 2 tbsp sunflower oil, knead again, roll out into a round flatbread and put in a buttered frying pan. While the pastry is rising, prepare the filling: chop boiled mushrooms, combine them with 1 tbsp fried onions, dress with 1 tbsp flour dissolved with cold mushroom broth, add salt, pepper, nutmeg to taste, chopped fresh parsley or dill, boil and cool. Put filling on the middle of the flatbread, pinch the edges of the pastry so that the middle of the pie remains open. Leave in a warm place to rise and bake in a hot oven. Put the baked pie on a dish, sprinkle the filling with mushroom broth and serve.

Kiev Cherry Pie

2 cups flour
1 cup sour cream
1 cup sugar
1 tsp soda
600g cherries
1 tbsp butter

Pound sour cream with sugar, add soda, gradually add flour. Make pastry, roll it out the size of your frying pan (buttered and floured). Turn up the edges of the pastry. Core cherries, put them densely and evenly on the pastry, sprinkle with sugar, decorate with a pastry grid, and bake. When the pie is half-baked, take out the cherries from the open part, pour sour cream over it, sprinkle with sugar and bake until ready.

Fruit Pies

for pastry:
2 tbsp flour
30g yeast
1 tsp sugar
1 tbsp mustard oil
1/2 tsp salt for rice and fish filling:
1/2 tbsp rice
200g salted fish
2 tbsp oil
2 onions

Prepare the pastry: dissolve yeast in a cup of warm water, then put 1 tbsp flour in a high saucepan, gradually add dissolved yeast, constantly stirring; if the mix is not dense enough add more flour. It should be as dense as high-fat sour cream. When the mix (called opara) rises 1 tbsp mustard oil (instead of usual eggs and butter), and stir thoroughly. Then add flour gradually, kneading the pastry hard. When it gets dense enough and stops sticking to the walls of the saucepan, knead it on a floured board trying not to add any more flour, however. Put the prepared pastry back in the same floured saucepan, close it and leave in a warm place for about 1 hour. Then take it out it carefully and (without kneading or beating) cut into fine pieces, roll each out, put the filling on them, pinch, brush with oil and put on a baking tray pinched side down very close to one another. Leave the pies to rest a little, then brush with sugared water and bake in the oven. Cooking rice and fish filling: Cooking rice: First rinse it thoroughly and leave for about half an hour in cold water. Meanwhile, bring water to boil in a big saucepan, add salt, and add the rice having drained it in a colander. Stir thoroughly, and boil until ready at high heat, trying from time to time to avoid over-boiling. A way to check the readiness of that rice is the following: take one grain of rice, and try to crush it with fingers. If it is crushed easily and no separate particles remain, the rice is ready. Generally, it is better to undercook it a little, as you can later finish it in butter. When the rice is ready, dry it in a colander. Meanwhile, heat 1 tbsp of sunflower oil in a saucepan, add the cooked rice, close it, and keep on the side of the stove to keep warm but avoid burning shaking it quite frequently. Chop onions finely and fry until golden. Cut fish into long thin stripes and boil it. Having prepared the pastry, fill it with rice mixed with onions, and a slice of fish on top, pinch them, brush with butter, put on a baking tray close to one another, and bake in the oven.

Vyaziga Pies

2 tbsp flour
30g yeast
1 tsp sugar
1 tbsp mustard oil
1/2 tsp salt for vyaziga and onion filling:
50g vyaziga (fish cartilages)
2 onions
1 tbsp lean oil
salt and pepper to taste

Prepare the pastry: dissolve yeast in a cup of warm water, then put 1 tbsp flour in a high saucepan, gradually add dissolved yeast, constantly stirring; if the mix is not dense enough add more flour. It should be as dense as high-fat sour cream. When the mix (called opara) rises 1 tbsp mustard oil (instead of usual eggs and butter), and stir thoroughly. Then add flour gradually, kneading the pastry hard. When it gets dense enough and stops sticking to the walls of the saucepan, knead it on a floured board trying not to add any more flour, however. Put the prepared pastry back in the same floured saucepan, close it and leave in a warm place for about 1 hour. Then take it out it carefully and (without kneading or beating) cut into fine pieces, roll each out, put the filling on them, pinch, brush with oil and put on a baking tray pinched side down very close to one another. Leave the pies to rest a little, then brush with sugared water and bake in the oven. Cooking vyaziga and onions filling: Soak vyaziga in warm water, rinse it thoroughly, put in warm water with salt, and boil until soft. Then dry and chill it a little, chop finely, combine with onions fried in lean oil, and add salt and pepper to taste.

Bon appetite!