Sirniki (Farmer's Cheese Pancakes)
Deliciously fluffy and tender, these Sirniki are pancakes made with farmer's cheese and perfect for breakfast or dessert. Top with fresh fruit, jam, or sweetened sour cream for an amazing combination.
Servings: 16 pancakes
Ingredients
- 14-15 oz farmer's cheese 2-2 ½ cups
- 2 eggs
- ¼ - ⅓ cup sugar
- 2 Tablespoon sour cream
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- ½ cup flour plus ½ cup more for dredging the Sirniki
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ⅓-1/2 cup raisins optional
- butter or oil for pan frying the Sirniki
Instructions
- Place the farmer's cheese into a food processor and pulse about 10 times until it's very fine. You can also use ricotta or cottage cheese instead of the farmer's cheese, just make sure to drain all the excess liquid and maybe even squeeze it out with a cheesecloth.
- Add the eggs, sugar, sour cream and vanilla. Pulse a few more times to combine.
- In a small bowl, mix ½ cup flour, baking powder and salt and then add the dry ingredients to the food processor. Pulse a few more times to combine.
- Add the raisins and mix them in with a spoon or spatula.
- Heat 1 Tablespoon of of butter or oil in a nonstick skillet on medium low heat. Make sure that the oil is hot enough before adding the Sirniki, otherwise they will soak up the oil and be very greasy.
- Place the remaining ½ cup flour into a shallow plate. I use a handy scoop to portion out this very delicate batter. It makes it MUCH easier to handle.
- Dredge each Sirnik in flour. You want to dredge the Sirniki and place them immediately into the skillet.
- Cook the Sirniki on medium low heat until they are golden on both sides.
- Serve warm with sour cream, jam, fruit, condensed milk or honey.
Notes
You can hand mix the Sirniki batter very easily, but you will first have to break up the farmer's cheese with a fork until the texture is even and fine. Proceed by adding the rest of the ingredients. It's much simpler for me to use the food processor, but the advantage of mixing the batter by hand is that it will be slightly stiffer and easier to handle. The batter made in the food processor needs to be handled quite delicately, but I have a trick for that too.
