Bierok

Many years ago, when I was still studying in Regina, my Grandma and I spent a summer cooking and baking together. We had compiled a list of all the favourite family recipes, and we went through each together, getting together early in the morning for breakfast and spending all day making the recipe of the day together. It's really too bad that all these cooking days were before I started this cooking blog, or at least before I got into the habit of updating it; oherwise I would have all the recipes and photos up here, which would be wonderful. We did Lemon Meringue Pie, Cinnamon Buns, Cabbage Rolls, Apple Pie, Caramel Rhubarb Pie, Turkey Noodle Soup, Borscht, Hamburger Soup, Spaezle, and so many more. Hopefully one day I will have eventually gotten around to photographing and uploading all of those recipes, so I can add them here. It's funny how sometimes the most important, or familiar family recipes are the ones you don't think to share.

Anyway, on my last trip home last summer, I ended up with a surprise overnight pit-stop in Winnipeg as a flight was cancelled, which I was able to spend with my Aunt and Uncle there. And when the conversation somehow came to Grandma and my cooking summer, Uncle A and Auntie M reminded me of Bierok, the delicious stuffed buns Grandma used to make her kids and us grandkids for packed lunches and after school snacks. Somehow this recipe had been forgotten in our many cooking days. So naturally Grandma and I booked a day of my holiday to make them together. This time I was wise enough to take photographs. 

Bierok

(Stuffed buns with meat and cabbage filling)

Ingredients:

• 1 batch of quick-rising bun dough. (I will post my recipe separately later and link here, but the Bierok can be made with whichever recipe you usually use for plain white or whole wheat bread or buns.)
• 2-3 medium onions
• 1 small package ground beef (about 1 cup)
• 1/2 a medium head of cabbage, finely chopped.
• some butter and oil to fry the cabbage (1-2 tsp)

Directions:

1. Prepare the dough as per recipe. As it is rising, preparing the Bierok filling.
2. Fry up one small package of ground beef, and 2-3 medium onions until there is no pink in the meat, and the onions are translucent. If there is too much fat, drain it. Season with salt and pepper. 
3. In another pan, fry the chopped cabbage with a little butter and oil until it starts to brown. Lightly browned is probably the best. You can fry the onions with either. 
4. Mix together and cool.
5. Now ready either bread or bun dough that has risen at least once to double in size. (I usually start making the dough with the filling, after the first rise as it takes a fairly long time if making a smaller amount. )
6. Once both the bun dough and filling are ready, you can pinch the bierok.
7. To fill and pinch the bierok, cut off small pieces of dough from the covered ball of dough, one at a time, and roll out on a floured surface. Fill them with a little bit of the meat and cabbage filling, and pinch closed. Once filled, set the bierok on a lightly buttered baking sheet, seam down. Continue until you have filled and pinched all the bierok.
8. Brush some melted butter on the bierok, and bake at 400 degrees F, until lightly browned (probably about 20 minutes, but perhaps less - make sure to check on them.)
9. Once the bierok are finished in the oven, let cool on clean dish cloths, and brush again with a little more melted butter.
10. Make sure you refrigerate bierok until you eat them, since there is meat in the filling. 
11. Serve warm.