Originally Published February 18, 2019
"No one is born a great cook, one learns by doing." - Julia Child
Some of my fondest memories from growing up are of me being in the kitchen with my Chumama (my great grandmother), Elizabeth, watching her cook and bake. I learned a few things along the way, but the one thing I never learned from her that I wish I had was her pogācsa. Pogācsa is a little Hungarian biscuit.
Any time I expressed to her that I wanted to learn she would sign and say to me with her thick, Hungarian accent, “It's hard work. Lots of folding. You fold it this way then you fold it that way. It's too much.”
I admitted defeat and stopped asking. When she died in early December of 2014, I was devastated. But that's a story for another day. Christmas that year was hard. I found myself thinking about the pogācsa and mentally kicked myself for not insisting more, at least for her to guide me through the process of making it. I promised myself that one day I would learn to make pogācsa. 4 years later I did.
Learn by doing.
My Mamama (grandmother) found Chumama’s Hungarian to English recipe book. Inside the book, the recipe for pogácsa. Her pogácsa. I already had on hand what the recipe called for and so began my first attempt at making that wonderful childhood memory. Unfortunately for me, the translation from Hungarian to English in the book wasn't smooth. Somewhere I had messed up.
Round 1:
They had the familiar taste of pogácsa, but the look of a basic dinner roll instead of the flaky biscuits my family knows and loves.
I shared my little mishap on Facebook. My friend, Dorottya, kindly shared with me her family's recipe so I gave it another go.
Round 2:
Dorottya's recipe called for 24oz of cottage cheese which I did not have on hand, but I had sour cream. I swapped the 24 oz of cottage cheese for about 16 oz of the sour cream. Other than that ingredient swap out, I followed her recipe to the letter. They turned out amazing! No offense to my Chumama, but this recipe was easy. I was prepared to do a lot of kneading and folding. Nope. Didn't need to. Perhaps that's the way Chumama had done it, but I didn't have to and they turned out just like hers. I was so happy and proud!
I hope you'll try this recipe! Enjoy!
Ingredients
2 whole eggs
16 oz of sour cream (original recipe called for 24 oz of small curd cottage cheese)
4 sticks unsalted butter (soften)
1 tablespoon dry yeast
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
6 cups white flour (one cup at a time)
Preheat the oven to 370
Mix everything together, knead the dough into a large ball, wrap up in plastic wrap, and chill in the fridge the night before.
Take out the next day and let sit until it reaches room temperature (about 2 hours).
Roll out the dough to about 1 inch thick.
Beat up one egg and use a brush to brush the top of the entire rolled-out dough.
I skipped adding any kind of topping, but you can use any toppings you like on the batch: sprinkle with light salt and pepper, shredded cheese, whole caraway seeds, or sesame seeds. The shallow hatch marks I did with a paring knife.
Use a small, biscuit cutter (I believe mine is 1 ¼ inch, so between a 1 inch to 1 ½ would be a good size) to make the little pogácsa.
Place them on a nonstick cookie sheet about half an inch to an inch apart.
Bake for 25 minutes