Lithuanian cuisine - Cepelinai

Time for some cooking. I occasionally like to experiment with food and I enjoy my country's national dishes. So I'll introduce you to some of it.

Cepelinai is a national dish. It's named so because it resembles the airship 'Zeppelin'. They are a type of dumplings made from grated potatoes and usually has ground meat (pork) inside, sometimes the meat is replaced by cottage cheese. It's served with sour cream and pork or bacon cracklings (spirgai).

Here's how you can make some yourself. It's quite a long process but if you have several people working on it it's really fun. Last time I was making there was 10 of us and we made them really quick, only the cooking took some time.

First you have to peel the potatoes and boil some then grate the rest.Later you will need to rice the boiled potatoes and squeeze the grated ones in a piece of cloth so it ends up dry. Save the fluid from the potatoes since at the bottom the starch will set. Then you should mix the potatoes take some into your hand and make a flat patty. Add some meat in the middle and start forming a football shape. Use the starch to coat them and add them to boiling water till done. 1 - 1.5 hours.

You can find some great recipes online or there's also some good illustrations here.

Good luck.

Many more posts to come!