Knish
Serves: 6-8
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It’s time for K of the ‘A-Z of Potatoes’ and we’ve landed on Knish 🥔🧀
Knish (kuh-NISH) is a traditional Jewish snack that has been super popular in Eastern Europe for hundreds of years, and for good reason. These golden potato buns have a flaky crust, deliciously cheesy, creamy centre and bucket loads of flavour. I opted to stuff mine with cheddar, cottage cheese, potato, onion and thyme but once you’ve mastered the art of Knish, you can customise the filling by adding minced meats, different cheeses or even a cheeky splodge of sauerkraut if you really want. To get mine to really ✨ GLISTEN ✨ I added a few egg-wash layers and baked in the oven instead of deep-frying. But you do you.
Also, please don’t let the long recipe steps put you off making these because a lot it is me kinda rambling about how to perfect the shape, it’s honestly not as complex as I’ve made it sound haha, I promise. To prove this, you can watch me make them here.
15 letters to go baby!
Ingredients
metric imperial
For the Filling
- 3 medium sized floury potatoes, uk maris piper/king Edwards us russet/Idaho
- 2 white onions
- 3 sprigs of thyme
- 100g grated cheddar
- 1 large tablespoon cottage cheese or sour cream
- Pinch of flakey salt / kosher salt
- 20g butter
- 1 egg yolk in a bowl with a pastry brush (or use your finger)
For the Dough
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 300g plain flour / all purpose flour
- 1 whole egg
- 40g soft butter
- 4-6 tbsp water
- 2 tbsp neutral oil like vegetable, sunflower
- 1 tbsp white wine vinegar
- Pinch of table salt
Method
- For the knish dough - Simply mix the dough ingredients together in a mixing bowl. Then, once it comes together tip it onto a clean surface and knead for 5 minutes. Or place in a stand mixer with the dough hook attachment and leave on low for 5 minutes.
- Once it has made a smooth dough, wrap it up and leave it in the fridge for at least 2 hours. It can be left overnight.
- For the filling - peel and chop your potatoes into even-sized pieces then get them into a saucepan and cover with cold water, season with salt and get on the hob to boil. Boil for 10 minutes or until tender enough to poke with a knife so they fall off the end.
- Drain the spuds through a colander and place a tea towel over them, leaving the spuds to dry out for 5 minutes.
- Next, chop your onions into little cubes, and in a frying pan on medium heat, add a splash of oil and a small knob of butter. Once the butter is bubbling add the onions, season with salt and pepper and add the thyme. Cook for around 10 minutes or until the onions have some golden colour, then remove from the heat and leave to cool slightly.
- When your potatoes and onions are ready (remove the thyme from the onions) get them both into a mixing bowl and add the cheese, cottage cheese or sour cream and the butter, then season. Next, using a fork, smush everything together until you have a rough mashed potato consistency. Give it a taste test and edit as you like.
- Preheat the oven to 180°C fan/ 350°F/gas mark 4 and line a baking tray with baking paper.
- Get the dough out of the fridge and on a lightly floured surface roll it out to around a 2mm thickness. You should almost be able to see the surface underneath.
- Trim the dough into a rectangle and a couple of centimetres away from the edge make a long, kind of thick sausage with the filling. You want to leave that couple of centimetres so that you can use the egg to stick the dough together.
- Brush egg yolk along the gap you’ve left next to the filling and fold the remaining dough over the filling (you will have excess dough) making what looks like a sausage roll. Press the dough together along the eggy bit and trim off any extra dough (this can be used again).
- Make indents along the pastry roll with the pinky edge of your hand, so it looks a bit like a flat Toblerone. You can change the size of these. I went big so I made about 6 but make them smaller if you wish. Then use a knife to cut into portions.
- Now at this point I would refer to my video cause I don’t know if I’ll be able to explain this right. But to shape, grab one of your portions and turn it 90° so that there’s an open edge on the bottom and an open edge on top….(does that make sense) then almost push it down to make it a bit rounded and make a little indent in the middle and pinch the dough into little spikes. I mean who knows if that is right but here we are. That’s the best your gonna get from me.
- Then get on the baking tray and using the yolk, brush the egg all over the buns. If you want them to be really golden all over, get them in the fridge for 15 minutes and then egg wash again.
- Once egg washed, get them in the oven for 30 minutes, then turn the tray around and cook for a further 10-15 minutes.
- Remove from the oven and dig in. They will be hot so give them a few to cool. Enjoy your Knish!