Uszka with mushrooms for barszcz: dried mushroom filling, hot-water dough
Sixty tiny dumplings that float in red barszcz on Christmas Eve. A filling of dried porcini and bay boletes, chopped rather than minced, with fried onion and plenty of pepper. A hot-water dough rolled to two millimetres, cut into four-centimetre squares, sealed into a ring around a fingertip. They can be made days ahead and frozen.
Your own work in that: 2 h.
- Mushrooms soaking 30 min
- Filling 40 min
- Dough 20 min
- Shaping 45 min
- Cooking 15 min
Step by step
0 / 7 done
Soak and cook the mushrooms
Rinse the mushrooms and cover with 250 ml warm water for 30 minutes. Then simmer them in the same water 25 minutes, until tender. Drain, strain the liquid through a fine sieve or muslin (grit settles at the bottom) and keep it: it is the best thing you can add to the barszcz.
Ingredients: 30 g dried forest mushrooms · 1 pcs onion · 20 g butter · 1 tbsp breadcrumbs · ½ tsp salt · ½ tsp black pepper
Half an hour in water, then 25 minutes of simmering
Make the filling
Soften the finely diced onion in the butter 8 minutes, until golden. Squeeze the cooked mushrooms and chop them very finely with a knife, don't mince them: minced, they easily turn into a claggy paste. Mix with the onion, salt and pepper; if the filling is wet, add the breadcrumbs.
TipThe filling should hold together when squeezed into a ball. It should taste distinctly peppery: in the barszcz the flavour is diluted.
Chopped by knife, not minced
Knead the dough
Pour the hot water with the oil into the flour and salt, mix with a spoon, then knead by hand 7 minutes into a smooth, soft dough. Wrap in film and rest 20 minutes. Hot water gives an elastic dough that rolls very thin and doesn't spring back.
Ingredients: 200 g plain flour · 100 ml water · 1 tbsp oil · ½ tsp salt
Smooth and soft, resting 20 minutes
Roll and cut into squares
Divide the dough in 3, roll one piece to 2 mm and cut into 4 × 4 cm squares with a knife or wheel. Put a ball of filling the size of a small hazelnut (about half a level teaspoon) in the middle of each — no more, an uszko is meant to be small. There is a little more dough than you need.
4 cm squares, filling the size of a small hazelnut
Seal into rings
Fold each square diagonally into a triangle and seal the edges. Then wrap the triangle round the tip of your index finger and pinch the two bottom corners together: that makes the ring. Lay them on a floured cloth.
TipIf the dough won't stick, wet the edge with a finger dipped in water. Work with a third of the dough at a time and keep the rest under a bowl so it doesn't dry.
A triangle, then the corners round a finger
Cook in batches
Bring a wide pot of salted water to the boil and lower to a gentle simmer. Drop in 20 uszka at a time, stir once. When they float, cook another 2 minutes and lift out with a slotted spoon. Uszka are cooked separately, never in the barszcz: the flour would cloud the clear broth.
They float, two minutes, slotted spoonServe in barszcz
Put 8–10 uszka in a bowl and pour hot, clear beetroot barszcz over them. Freeze spares raw on a tray, then bag them; cook from frozen a minute longer.
Ten uszka and a ladle of barszcz
Before you start
With sauerkraut and mushrooms
150 g stewed sauerkraut, squeezed and finely chopped, in the filling. It comes out moister and sharper; then the breadcrumbs are essential.
Fried
Boiled uszka fried in butter are served as a snack, without barszcz. Good on the second day of Christmas.
How many per person
Count 8–10 uszka per bowl of barszcz. Sixty pieces make six Christmas Eve portions, or eight if the barszcz is one of twelve dishes.
Nutrition
per 100 gStep photos are computer-generated from the recipe.
