Mennonite Heritage and
Agricultural Museum
New Years cookies
Traditionally, these raisin fritters or Porzelke, were made especially for New Year's Day; today they will hit the spot any time of the year. The term Porzelke means "tumbling over"; these treats turn over by themselves (when they are done on one side) after being dropped into hot oil.
Food-Ethnic Favorites
Low-German rhyme about New Years cookies
Eck sach dem Shornshstein Roacka.
Eck visst voll vaut ya moacke,
Ya backte Niejoash koaka.
Yave ye me eane
Dann bliev eck stoane
Yave ye me twea
Dann fang eck aun to goane
Yave ye me drea, fea, feef toaglick
Donn vensch eck you daut gaunse Himmelrick.
English:
I saw your chimney smoking.
I knew what you were making.
You were baking New Year's cookies.
Give me one - I stand still.
Give me two - I start walking.
Give me three, four, five at once,
Then I wish you the Kingdom of Heaven.
Volunteers got up very early to
produce over 1,200 New Years cookies for 2016 Country Threshing Days in August. They were sold out by 3:00 p.m. on Sat.
Rullcoka ( Crullers )
Rolling out the dough.Denise Woelk rolls out the cruller dough. | Cutting the dough. |
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Frying the rullcoka. | Watermelon a wonderful summer treat |
Rullcoka and watermelon |
Rullcoka (Crullers)
1/2 C. cream
1/2 C. milk
2 eggs
2t. baking powder
1t. salt
Flour, enough for soft dough
Mix cream, milk, and eggs. Add baking powder, salt, and flour. Knead in flour till soft dough. Roll out thin. Cut in 2x4" pieces. Fry in deep fat till brown.
Rullcoka are best when eaten warm and are usually served with watermelon.
Agatha Schmidt Duerksen
From the Mennonite Heritage Museum cookbook FROM PLUMA MOOS to PIE
Rullcoka means roll "cookies". They are made much as doughnuts are. The dough, however, is different and the finished product is much lighter and crisper than doughnuts are. The dough is rolled out quite thin and cut into rectangular pieces, perhaps 2 by 5 inches or 1 by 3 inches. Some cooks also cut a one-inch lengthwise slit along the center. The crullers are then dropped into hot deep fat and fried until they are a rich golden brown. They come out crisp with big holes from air bubbles in the inside.
Fresh crullers eaten with waternelon are considered an especially good combination.
This disscription of "Rullcoka" is taken from the Mennonite cookbook OFF THE MOUNTAIN LAKE RANGE published in 1958. ( No longer in print ).
These Low-German Mennonite immigrants came from the same Colony (area) of Russia (Ukraine) as the Goessel area Mennonites, but settled in Mountain Lake, Minnesota.
Verenika (cottage cheese filled dough pockets)
Verenika (there are many different spellings of this type of Russian Mennonite food). Verenika came into the Mennonite diet from their time in Ukraine. Their Russian neighbors used many different fillings for these dumpling but the one that caught on with the Low=German
Mennonites was cottage cheese.
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5 cups flour
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1 t. salt
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5 t. baking powder
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5 eggs
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1 to 1 1/2 c. milk
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5 T. shortening (oil or melted butter)
Add enough milk to eggs to make 1 1/2 cups.
Beat. ( Measure before beating.) Mix dry ingredients, add egg, milk and shortening mixture. (More flour may be needed to make a soft rollable dough.)
Filling
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4 cartons dry cottage cheese, made fine
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2 eggs
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salt and pepper
Roll out a portion of dough at a time on floured board. Put about 2 T. filling about 2 in. from the edge, fold over and cut with a large doughnut cutter, pinch edges well. Make sure they are sealed. Fry in deep fat (turning once) until well browned. Makes about 24.
Selma Duerksen
From the Mennonite Heritage Museum cookbook FROM PLUMA MOOS to PIE
Here you see the verenika being covered with a ham gravy. Or they can be simply doused with pancake syrup.
2014-2024 Mennonite Heritage
and Agricultural Museum
Created by Fern Bartel nee Schmidt