Fridge Cleaning and Vareniki Recipe

Hello, everyone. I hope you are having a great day. I wish you all happy days with your family and loved ones. Today, I made vareniki with potatoes and I'm going to share the recipe with you. I started my day with cleaning. I wanted to clean the fridge. I knew I couldn't clean the entire fridge today, so I began with the freezer. I plan to clean the freezer and sort out everything inside it. Everything is chaotic and disorganized, so I need to set it in order. If I can't finish today, I'll continue tomorrow. For now, I'm going to take everything out and wash it.

The drawers are in bad shape, I've been meaning to clean them for a while and I finally made a plan to do it. Some things have started to thaw, so I need to sort them out. I'll put the meats in one drawer, some pre-prepared ingredients in another and vegetables and fruits in the third drawer.

That's it, now it even looks better to the eye. On top, there's some greenery, mint, spinach and fruits. There's also bacon and cottage cheese. The drawer below is full of meats and is a bit hard to open because it's heavy. The other drawer is almost empty, with just a few vegetables in it. I'm planning to make potato dumplings for dinner, we haven't had them in a long time and I've been really craving them. This is one of those tasks that keeps getting delayed, there's always something that seems more urgent. But it actually only took about 20 minutes to clean the fridge and a major task is completed. Now everything is organized. I hope you get to experience this feeling too.

The fridge is almost empty, which makes cleaning easier. Instead of taking all the shelves out at once, I decided to do it one at a time. After clearing a shelf, I clean it and then put it back in place. This way, the task seems less daunting.

I don't even have to wash the fridge shelves, I just wipe them with a damp cloth and dry them. Most of the time, that's all it takes. The shelves have protective liners and I clean those in the same way, just wiping them with a damp cloth. The shelves weren't really dirty, so there was no need for extensive cleaning. Some people think using various storage containers in the fridge is a disadvantage because you have to clean them too. But I have a different opinion.

When there are small particles or crumbs on the shelves, just wiping them with a damp cloth is usually enough. Especially if there are protective liners, a simple wipe is sufficient. My fridge is generally clean because when I notice any dirt, I address it immediately, if there are a few crumbs or small stains, I clean them right away. But still, from time to time, it's necessary to take everything out and clean thoroughly to keep the fridge fresh and clean.

There's a large pot in my fridge, so I folded the shelf to fit it in. Some people are surprised to see a pot in the fridge, especially since I've bought storage containers, yet the pot remains. I use the containers for less important items, but transferring a big pot into a container is challenging, so the pots stay in the fridge. Everything is clean and organized now. I also cleaned the outside and now it's shining like a mirror.

Now I'm going to start making dumplings, which we haven't had in a while and we've missed them.

First, let me talk about the ingredients. For vareniki, I use 3 cups of flour, a pinch of salt, 1 egg, 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil and water. For the filling, I boil potatoes. We like it this way, but you can also use cheese, meat, mushrooms, or cabbage. The fillings can vary depending on the region and family recipes. Typically, vareniki with savory fillings are served with butter or sour cream, while those with sweet fillings are served with sugar or powdered sugar.

The potatoes I took out of the fridge are cooling down. I'm using my favorite dough recipe. It’s made with a 3-to-1 ratio. Three cups of flour to one cup of liquid (which contains one egg). I add a teaspoon of salt, but not too much since the potatoes are a bit salty. I add two tablespoons of olive oil and mix it with water. Then I add this to the flour and knead it.

This dough, in my opinion, has a perfect consistency. It doesn't require much additional flour while kneading. The dough hardly sticks and is easy to roll out. I start kneading with a spoon and then use my hands. We typically make our dumplings with potatoes, but the potato and mushroom combination is also delicious.

After kneading the dough, I let it rest for about 20 minutes before continuing. The dough becomes very elastic and soft. Then I roll it into a thin sheet and cut out small circles. I use a special tool for this, a dough cutter. I bought it online and it's quite handy. Even though the cuts might not be perfectly symmetrical, I can cut many circles at once. Now, I'm starting to fill the vareniki. I prefer simple edge sealing, so I don't add much decoration. I just press the edges firmly and the vareniki are ready.

I didn't make too many because I used only three cups of flour for the dough. The potato quantity was just right, I used as much as I boiled. Now we're going to boil them and they will be delicious. I chopped a bit of garlic and mixed it with melted butter. This is how we eat vareniki, pouring it over makes it incredibly tasty. The vareniki are boiling now and everyone who tastes them loves them. If you haven't tried it yet, I recommend you try it this way, it's really good. You can also try it with mayonnaise or sour cream.

I hope you enjoyed this post. It might be in a slightly different format, but I hope you liked it. Thank you for reading. Take care and see you in my next posts.