Recreate a meal from your childhood – #VeganMoFo – Leniwe Pieroshki

Another day, another Vegan MoFo Prompt – recreate a meal from your childhood. Well. When I was a little girl, one of my favourite things to eat were Leniwe Peiroshki (pronounced [by me]: Leh-niv-eh Pyeh-rosh-ki, translated = Lazy Perogies). The name is misleading as it wasn’t really that easy to prepare (though still probably easier than making perogies.) But it’s a great way to use potatoes, if for some reason you had some left over (which I don’t understand, but whatever.)

I remember sitting around the kitchen table watching my mom make these for me and me being pretty excited. A lot of my happy childhood memories involve being in the kitchen – watching my mom cook, helping prepare something, “helping” to make real perogies with my late-grandmother in the middle of the night a few days before christmas, lots of happy memories center around the kitchen. So this prompt is a fun little trip down memory lane too.

Normally Leniwe Peiroshki involves quark (a type of dairy based cheese that’s sort of like a paste & usually a bit sour) which is of course not on my menu anymore. But I’ve noticed that there is a vegan cream cheese made in Toronto from Yoso, that has a very similar texture (at least to what I remember quark being like.) Ever since I made that connection, I was curious about making my favourite childhood dish myself and sharing the recipe. This prompt seems like the perfect opportunity to do just that.

Ingredients

• 1 package yoso plain cream cheese (I think daiyas plain one would also work great for this)
• 300 g potatoes, boiled and mashed (or just use potato flakes)
• 1-2 flax eggz (1-2tbsps of flax meal, 3-6tbsp water)
• salt
• 5 Tbsp flour (or more)
• melted Earth Balance and breadcrumbs to serve

Mash cream cheese and potatoes together, but not too much because potatoes are starchy and can turn this thing into a rubber. Add the flax eggz (or your favourite egg replacement powder, chia seeds, just do not use bananas.), salt and some of the flour (start with a tablespoon or two) Mix it together.

• The dough should be soft, but not sticky.
• Shape into rolls, flatten a bit, and cut them so that they’re about an inch or so (or smaller) – choose your own adventure.
• Boil water with a pinch of salt in a pot.
• Add the lazy perogies and cook them around 2-3 minutes until they float to the top.
• Remove them with a slotted spoon.
• While they’re boiling, fried up some bread crumbs in some oil or vegan butter.
• Place the perogies on a plate and cover them with breadcrumb butter magic.
• Eat and enjoy. Pretend you’re a 7 year old meshell.

Of course after all of that… I didn’t get the chance to actually make these.

The day was busier than anticipated. But I feel confident in my food combo science, and will make these this weekend. Hopefully for breakfast. (and hopefully wont have to make too many edits!)

I also found this lazy mix at Benna’s Fine Food (135 Roncesvalles Avenue), so I might just use that to make my childhood favourite even lazier.