We vacationed in Finland recently and one of the things I fell in love with is Karelian pies (karjalanpiirakka in Finnish). They were often served for breakfast (ohh the lovely hotel breakfast) but can be eaten at any time of day. I missed them enough when I got home that I decided to try making my own.
Notes:
- I used Arborio rice because I didn't think I was going to find the traditional type of rice, and with its creamy texture I thought it would work better than Japanese rice.
- I used half and half instead of milk because it was what I had on hand, and omitted the butter in the filling.
- You can make the filling ahead and chill it to make it a little easier to assemble.
- I added an extra splash of water into my crust dough because I thought it was a little too dry.
- I only used maybe 3 tbsp each of the melted butter and milk for brushing, didn't do the brushing step halfway through cooking, and they still tasted fine and there was mixture left over.
- The recipe author isn't kidding when they say heavily floured board. The dough is fairly sticky. I poured out what I thought would be too much extra flour and ended up using pretty much all of it.
- 4-5 tbsp filling per pie is a better estimate than the 3 tbsp written in the recipe. I got toward the end and realized I was going to have filling left over so I REALLY piled it in those last few.
- 500 F oven seems quite hot but please trust it! It worked just fine for me.
- I made egg butter with 2 boiled eggs and about 4 tbsp Irish style butter and it worked nicely.
- If the rice porridge filling is not your thing, these can also be made with mashed potatoes, fish, or meat as the filling.
Verdict: These are definitely bigger than the ones at hotel breakfast, and were kind of a lot of work, but they tasted really good! I would gladly make this recipe again if I had a craving for them.
--------------------
RECIPE: Karelian Pies (Inspired by Maps)
