Syrniki (cottage cheese pancakes)
35 min · 17 g protein · 218 cals / serving
The Eastern European breakfast-or-dessert pancake that is almost all cheese: dry curd cottage cheese bound with an egg and a little flour, shaped into thick rounds, browned in butter and finished in the oven so they are golden outside and soft, tender and gently sweet inside. Served warm with sour cream and a quick warm raspberry sauce.
Ingredients
- 1 lb dry curd cottage cheese, or farmer's cheese (tvorog); or 1 % cottage cheese drained overnight in a sieve
- 1 egg
- 1 1/2 tsp granulated sugar
- 1/4 tsp stevia, pure stevia powder, to taste
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp lemon zest
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/3 cup all-purpose flour, 35 g in the dough, 10 g for shaping
- 1 1/2 tsp butter
- 2 cups frozen raspberries
- 1 small pinch stevia, pure stevia powder
- 1/3 cup fat free sour cream, or smetana, to serve
Steps
- Heat the oven to 350°F. If your cheese has any visible whey, squeeze it in a clean tea towel; the dough must be dry. Mash the cheese with a fork (or pulse briefly in a food processor) until fine and even, then mix in the egg, egg white, sugar, stevia, vanilla, zest and salt. Stir in 35 g of the flour to make a soft, slightly sticky dough.
- Dust a board with the remaining 10 g of flour. Divide the dough into 12 balls, roll each in the flour and pat into a round about ¾ inch thick. Use a large non-stick frying pan; this soft dough sticks to anything else. Brown the syrniki in two batches of 6 so they are not crowded: melt half the butter over medium heat and cook 2–3 minutes per side, until deep golden, then repeat with the rest of the butter. Move them to a lined tray and bake 8–10 minutes, until they puff slightly and feel springy.
- Meanwhile, warm the raspberries in a small pan with the stevia and a tablespoon of water for 3–4 minutes, mashing lightly, into a loose sauce.
- Serve 3 syrniki each, warm, with a spoonful of sour cream and the raspberry sauce.
Good to know
Why dry curd cottage cheese?
Syrniki are made with tvorog, a dry, crumbly curd. Regular cottage cheese is too wet and needs more flour to hold, which makes them heavy; dry curd or farmer's cheese gives the classic soft, tender inside. If you only have regular cottage cheese, drain it overnight in a sieve lined with a coffee filter.
Mine fall apart in the pan.
The dough was too wet. Chill it 20 minutes and add a tablespoon more flour, and keep the heat at medium so the crust forms before you flip.
Raisins?
A small handful in the dough is traditional. Sour cherry jam or a spoon of honey instead of the raspberry sauce is too.
Alternative
Per
- Calories
- 104
- Protein
- (33%)
- 8 g
- Fat
- (15%)
- 2 g
- Carbohydrates
- (52%)
- 14 g
- of which sugar
- 3 g
- Fiber
- 2 g
- Sodium
- 281 mg
More breakfast
Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. How
As written, 874 kcal goes into the pot and 933 g of ingredients comes out as about 840 g of food: 104 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.