I heart dumplings

This will be almost an ode to dumplings but, really, how can you not love them?

Done well, they are little homey pieces of comfort food bursting with flavor. Russian dumplings – and there are multiple varieties (pelmeni, manty, vareniki) are, in my entirely biased opinion, some of the best out there. We’ll need to do a post on ‘Dumplings of the world’ because it is actually a pet peeve of mine when people say that Chinese dumplings, dim sum, ravioli, wontons, and pelmeni are all about the same thing. Dumpling experts, we’ll be looking for volunteers! Minyi & Priya have actually made dumplings from scratch and, I think, even documented this process at some stage so hopefully, we’ll hear from them on that topic soon.

This past weekend I was in St Petersburg where I was lucky enough to stumble upon a local hole-in-the-wall pelmennaya (dumpling house) in the basement of an old residential building. It was filled with locals at 12pm and served only one kind of delicate, homemade meat dumplings with dill and sour cream – delicious!