Pelmeni

When we took our cruise on the Volga River, my sister-in-law Katherine and I went to a cooking class and learned to make pelmeni, which are Russian dumplings.  The meat filling is wrapped in a thin, non-leavened dough.  As soon as we got back from our trip, I ordered a pelmeni mold but it has just been sitting in my cabinet for the last year and a half.

My excuse for breaking it out and actually making the pelmeni was Emma Larson's mission call to the Baltics Mission where she will be serving in Estonia.  I've known Emma since she was a cute little two year old and it was great getting to know grown-up, confident, talented and strong in the gospel Emma. Interestingly enough she will be the only missionary at the Mission Training Center learning Estonian.  It isn't a very big mission and there are only 6 sister missionaries there right now.  Another fun thing is that Emma has the voice of an angel and has been a standout in several choirs.  Guess what?  Estonians love choir!  Choir is a required course in all Estonian schools.  They are going to LOVE Emma!

 Since a lot of Estonian food is actually Russian food, pelmeni seemed like the perfect dinner to share with the Larson family.  

You make a fairly basic dough, roll it out very thin and then place it on the pelmeni mold and roll your rolling pin across it so that the shapes are distinctive.  The filling is a mixture of raw ground pork and beef with some grilled onions..

 After you have the filling placed on each shape, you put another thin sheet of dough on top, toll again until the shapes are definite. 

Then you just press them through,  crimp the edges, and boil. 

They can be topped with just about anything from catsup to sour cream to mushroom gravy.  We loved the gravy!