Wickets (they are presots, carols) are traditional pastries in Karelian cuisine, reminiscent of our shanki with cottage cheese , or potatoes . Wickets are small pies made of rye dough with various fillings (cereal cereals, oatmeal, potatoes, mushrooms, cheese), putty, crockery, or bakery. Wickets can be of various shapes: round, oval, with four, five, six and even seven corners. The edges are either tied or bent.
The tradition of preparing wickets is widespread not only in Karelia, but also in the Northeast of Russia, beyond the Urals and in Finland, where they are called kalittoa or karjalan piirakka, literally "Karelian pies" (Finnish).
Karelian saying-rule about the preparation of wickets: "Kalittoa - kyzyy kaheksoa" literally means "Wicket requests eight". In fact, to prepare traditional wickets, you need eight components: rye flour, yogurt, milk, water, salt, sour cream, butter and stuffing.
Recipe of Karelian wickets from rye flour with potatoes
Ingredients (12 wickets)
For the test:
- rye flour - about 0.5 kg;
- sour cream is natural - about 130-150 ml;
- natural milk - 150 ml;
- salt - pinch.
For filling:
- potatoes - 5-6 pcs. medium size;
- chicken egg - 1-2 pieces;
- butter natural - 2-3 tbsp. spoons;
- hard grated cheese - 150 g.
Preparation
First stuffing. We will clear and boil potatoes, a little cool and mash it in mashed potatoes. Add a lightly beaten egg and melted butter. Slightly add, carefully mix to homogeneity and set aside, let it cool.
Now the dough. We mix in sour cream and milk. We mix it. Sieve in a bowl of rye flour, add a little salt and, gradually adding sour cream, mix the dough. The dough should be elastic and supple. We wrap it in a food film (or cover the bowl with a dry clean towel) and let it stand for 20-30 minutes.
How to cook wickets?
When the dough is sufficiently spaced, form a "sausage" from it and divide it into 12 approximately equal parts (at this point it is possible to turn on the fire in the oven, let it warm up in advance). On the work surface sprinkled with flour, we roll out round cakes with a thickness of 1.5-2 mm (which after a certain practice is easy and at ease). Spread in the middle of each cake for 2 tbsp. spoons of the filling. On both sides we turn the edges to the middle and tear them with an approximate interval of 1 cm. Open pies of oval shape are obtained. You can, of course, give wickets and round shape, because the sacred tradition of cooking this bake goes back to the ancient solar cults. You can make them polygonal.
We bake. Carefully shift the wickets on a baking tray, oiled (it would be nice to spread it with baking paper, and then lubricate it). We place a baking sheet with wickets in an oven heated up to 180-200 degrees. Bake for 20-25 minutes. For each of the ready hot wickets, put a small piece of butter and sprinkle cheese on top. We are waiting for the cheese to melt slightly. Another 15 minutes, you need to wait until the wickets are a bit stiff. We serve the table and enjoy a wonderful dish of northern cuisine. To wickets you can serve tea, coffee, herbal infusions, berry juice, yogurt.
Sometimes the dough is made from a mixture of rye and wheat flour. In the old days, wheat in the northern parts did not grow, so wheat flour was too expensive.
As filling, you can use cooked buckwheat, rice or other porridges mixed with chopped mushrooms. Mushrooms can be used salted or marinated - then they are pre-washed. You can use fresh mushrooms, in this case they are pre-cooked or cooked with onions - also very tasty.