Russia ~ Breakfast ~ Sirniki

Sirniki

Feeling bad about my lack of motivation to heat up my kitchen for hearty meal, I decided that I would cook early in the morning to avoid my summer heat wave induced coma come 7 pm. My air conditioner did not complain too badly about the stove being on and all in all my house stayed cool, my kids stayed full and I stayed happy, not to mention, I have another recipe to blog about. 

What you see before you is pretty much a pancake, Russian style.

Preparation is a bit different, but the list of ingredients is minimal and today I could really get into minimal. It might come as a big surprise but I really don't dig the heat. 75 and below with a cool breeze and the sun out is pretty much perfect for me, anything over 85 and you will find me parked in front of a fan with an ice cold drink complaining. 

Right so, enough about me, on to the recipe.

This little breakfast morsel was discovered at a cute blog called Russian Bites. Several Russian recipes and they all look good.

If you want to see the original recipe then go here!

Ingredients (makes 5 sirniki):

• 1/2 lb farmers cheese
• 1 egg
• ~1 cup flour+ (I used whole wheat pastry flour with good results but traditionally all-purpose white flour is used)
• 1-2T butter for frying (my mom often does a 50/50 combo of butter and canola oil as well)

1. Mix cheese, egg and some of the flour. The amount of flour will depend on how “wet” your cheese is. You don’t want your dough to be too dry.
2. Divide into little cakes
 3. Cover in flour
4. Melt butter in a medium-high heated skillet
5. Fry for about 5 minutes on each side, until golden brown.

What I did Differently

So I used Ricotta cheese instead of Farmers. I was in a pinch and that was all I had on hand. I also had to double the recipe as I was feeding three teenagers and myself. Two of those teenagers being boys, so needless to say, everyone in my house was "Huuuuuuuuuungry" Just like that too, not to be confused simply hungry. I should have made my patties a bit thicker to really get the cheese texture but I flattened them a bit in an attempt to get as many cakes as I could make from the dough. Next time I will remember not to do that. I used a sour cream and raspberry jam mixture rather then the sweetened condensed milk as a topper.

My Families Reaction

I will say I was a bit worried as to how anything with Ricotta cheese would go over in my house. Trying new foods can sometimes be a challenge in my house also, even teenagers who have a mom who is always cooking from new places can be amazingly picky so don't feel bad if one of your kids says "ewwww" before even trying it. It was very good.
All my kids finished everything on their plates and did so willingly and without threats. Yay!!