Sunday, Bierock Sunday

My friend Thereasa does not cook.

Don't get me wrong-- there are baking forays and occasional meals, but for the most part her husband takes care of prepping dinner and the like. We'd been talking about making bierocks, one of the few things she makes on a semi-regular basis. Her grandmother used to make them, and though she doesn't have a set recipe, they always turn out delicious. She came over last Sunday and we whipped some up (although "whipped" might be a little inaccurate seeing as how it took most of the afternoon).

We started by dicing about half of a large red onion and making small medallions out of some baby carrots. In a large pot with a heavy bottom, we added the ground turkey and stirred it around a bunch with some salt and pepper until it began to color. Then Thereasa dumped in the onion and carrot.

Since there isn't a set recipe, Thereasa just kept adding the aromatics until the mix looked right to her. I'd say it was about a half of a small bag of baby carrots. I'm sure you could use full sized carrots, diced to about the same size as the rounds. I think for variation and shape if I do this by myself I will likely use baby carrots, but cut them into a slightly smaller triangle dice, so that all of the veggies are somewhat the same size. I might even shred the carrot. While that happened, I sauteed some potatoes-- I overcrowded the pan a bit, and I'd suggest *not* doing that.

Thereasa cut up some zuchinni and we added it into the mix. We used about a half of a package (each) of frozen corn and frozen peas. We seasoned the mix pretty liberally with salt and pepper, Worcestershire sauce, summer savory, sage, oregano, rosemary and whatever else was in the hamburger-seasoning mix Thereasa brought over. I'd say go easy on the pepper and salt-- remember, you can always add more but it's hard to take away! If I make these on my own, I think I'll add a little more Worcestershire, and use white onions instead of red. I'm a big fan of red onions in salads but I like white and yellow onions for cooking. Next time I'll add some more fresh garlic, too. If you wanted to be really lazy you could always buy a package of frozen vegetables that has carrots, peas and corn. We forgot cabbage, but that sounds like it would be a great addition. Also, I think I'd add celery.

Wikipedia tells me that bierocks are an Eastern European thing-- likely of German origin-- and my search on the internet confirms it to be true. Since they're a meat-filled pastry, we needed something to wrap around the mix.


Thereasa rolled out the dough on a floured surface. We used pre-made bread dough from the grocery but you could absolutely make your own. Since beirocks are already a lot of work, we decided it was ok to skip that part. Thereasa was a dough-pro-- I haven't had much practice and mine came out a bit wonky. She was gracious enough about it but honestly it was a little ridiculous. Just means I better make some fresh bread soon, right?

We spooned about two teaspoons of mix onto each square. Once the mix was apportioned, we gathered each end of the dough and pinched the seams closed. The beirocks formed little squares. We tried thin dough and thick dough and found it didn't make much of a difference. We popped the bierocks into pre-heated oven (I forget what the temp was-- we just followed the instructions on the package for the dough) and let them bake for about 22 minutes.

Once they were done we took a stick of butter and rubbed it over the top to give it a delicious sheen. We repeated this process until we ran out of the innards. We used two pounds of ground turkey, but that won't fill six loaves of dough. (I'm thinking if we make these again we will be writing things down for a more accurate recipe!)



Yumz.

The big question was what to do with the extra dough-- I didn't have any ground meat (or much of anything, really) laying around the kitchen. I opened the fridge and inspiration struck!

Beirock dessert!

I took a Gala apple, diced it and threw it into two tablespoons of melted butter. I cooked it on medium heat in a non-stick skillet with some cinnamon, nutmeg and a pinch of cloves. I added a dash of kosher salt and about a teaspoon of honey. The juice was pretty thin so I sifted the tiniest bit of cornstarch over the apples and mixed well. Thereasa rolled out the extra dough and cut it into squares. I have one of those raw sugar/cinnamon grinders from McCormicks so I dusted the interior of the dough with it. Then we spooned out the apple mixture and sealed the pockets. Since these were diffent from the meat bierocks, we made them a little rounder. We popped 'em into the oven. When they came out I dusted them again with cinnamon/sugar thing and also a bit of powdered sugar just to make it prettier.



There was a little exta dough-- we rolled it like snickerdoodle in the cinnamon/sugar after getting it all buttery. The apple balls turned out pretty well and Thereasa said, "This is a new addition when making bierocks!" I think if I did it again I'd knead some sugar into the dough before rolling it out and use more than one apple. The innards were a little thin but overall, not too bad for an improvisation!



But what the hell!? There was STILL dough left over! Hmmm... better make cheesey bread twists!

We cut the dough into strips, shredded some jack cheese and sandwiched it between two strips. We pinched them every inch-and-a-half or so just to make sure they would hold together and then twisted 'em together. While they were baking I melted butter with crushed gloves of garlic (I did it in the microwave, taking the easy way). When the twists came out of the oven I brushed on the butter and sprinkled a little bit of kosher salt across the twists.



Finally, we were out of dough. Phew! The cheese bread twists were super yummy and a great way to use up the extra dough if you don't want to make a loaf of bread.

The bierocks make a perfect lunch when eating two at a time, or just one for a snack. We sent most of them home with Thereasa and her hubby because I had the dinner menu planned already and didn't feel like revising. Next time I'll keep more-- this was a bit of an impromptu bierock sesh. I've eaten them room temp and also piping hot-- both tasty.

You could fill the dough with practically anything. N & I have been contemplating the possibilities and I'm thinking sausage, more aromatics... broccoli and cheese... Thereasa and I wondered about doing PB&J but I'm not sure how that would work out-- next time we'll have to make a tester just to see.

Since we sort of worked from the fly and not a recipe, here are some links I found for some bierock recipes:

All-recipe calls them german turnovers

The fresnohub offers up a few recipes (funny enough, Thereasa is from the Fresno area)

Jim and Tom over at plainsfolk.com give this traditional variation