Cepelinai (Vilnius' Potato Zeppelins Stuffed with Meat) 🥔

Método

1. 1

   Grate the raw potatoes extremely fine, then squeeze out the liquid through cloth and let the starch settle in the juice — pour off the water and return the black starch paste to the pulp. Mix with the cooked riced potato, egg, salt and enough extra starch to make a moldable, slightly tacky dough.

2. 2

   Season the minced meat with grated onion, salt and marjoram; roll into sausages about as long as a finger.

3. 3

   Take a fist of dough, flatten in your palm, lay a meat cylinder down the middle, close it into a cigar and smooth the seams with wet hands — no cracks, or they fall apart in the water.

4. 4

   Lower into gently boiling salted water, three or four at a time; when they rise to the surface, simmer 3–4 minutes more, about 20 minutes total for a big one.

5. 5

   Fry the bacon with sliced onion until dark and crisp, warming the sour cream into the pan juices. Plate a zeppelin, drown it in the lard-onion crackling and sour cream; mushroom sauce for the devout. The honest portion is two. Nobody finishes two.