Popalak AKA Potato Pizza

I don't know where the name Popalak came from except that I know it from my mother in law. This is what my husband's family calls it. This post is dedicated to her with great amounts of love.
My MIL was able to feed a very large family for very little money with her creative recipes. Sometimes I have learned that what she calls something isn't what other people think that thing is.
For Popalak, I don't even see it being something that other people think is even a thing : )
I tried to Google it.
It's really good, pretty easy to make, inexpensive for a large family.
It also probably has almost zero nutritional value. When we make this, it's because it's a comfort food on a cold winter day. Not for healthy eating reasons.

Here's what you need:

1 pizza crust in a tube (like a crescent roll container, only it's pizza crust)
5 lbs potatoes. You can use which ever type you like best.
10 slices of American cheese.
Onion salt 
Pepper
20 oz shredded mozzarella cheese.
Paprika
Baking spray

Baking spray, aluminum foil or a cover for your pan, and a 13x9 glass pan. 

Cut your potatoes in half and then quarter them again. Plop them into a pan of water (make sure the water covers them)  and get them boiling on the stove. Your going to boil them until they are just tender when stuck with a fork.

In the mean time, spray the bottom of your 13x9 baking pan and lay the pizza crust over the bottom only of the pan.
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
Lay your slices of American cheese over the pizza crust. Now you wait until your potatoes are ready.

Again, you want to boil them just until a fork can easily be stuck in them, but don't go too far or they'll be mushy.
Drain your potatoes, rinse with cold water to stop the cooking and drain all water.
Use your shredder and grate the potatoes over the pizza crust and cheese in the pan. You will be making an even layer here, Maybe an inch tall.

Most of the parts of this recipe can be adjusted for your taste. Less potato, more potato. Less cheese, different cheese. Add diced onions, what ever you want. 
Season with onion salt and pepper.
Once you have your potato layer, you will add your mozzeralla cheese layer.
Add paprika, cover with aluminum foil and bake for about a half hour.
You will know it's done when the pizza crust is a beautiful golden brown on the bottom.

While the oven is already hot, why not make a Cherry Dump Cake for dessert?



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Golumpki Rolls... so delicious and easy to make

10 years ago in order to make me I'll I would have to buy almost every ingredient at the store during the week I wanted to make it. I bought a lot of pre-made meals and most of our food was processed somehow. We've come a long way since we bought our farm. And I truly do love it. I love having control over the food that we eat. And I love that as time goes by, we become less reliant on the world around us. Today I was able to make something where everything we needed was in our pantry with the exception of a 2 pound bag of sauerkraut . And to me - that rocks : )

 Here's what you need for the filling:
1 cup of hydrated hamburger rocks or 1/2 pound ground beef
1/4 cup hydrated onion or 1/2 cup chopped onion
Optional 1/4 cup dehydrated green bell pepper or 1/2 cup chopped green bell pepper
Salt and pepper to taste.

2 lb bag of sauerkraut 

 Heat up the hamburger, onion (bell pepper) and sauerkraut. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Set aside cool while you make the dough.

You will need:

1 packet of dry active yeast

4 1/2 cups flour (white, wheat or a mix of both)

1 cup milk

1/4 cup organic cane sugar

1/3 cup butter

1 tsp salt

2 eggs

Add 1 packet of dry active yeast and 2 cups of flour to your mixing bowl.

On the stove top you gently heat milk, sugar, and salt to 115 degrees. I always use thermometer for this because my judgement of warm is not good for this process and it has to be warm enough to activate the yeast but not too hot so that you kill the yeast. 

Once it reaches 115 degrees, remove from heat, add two eggs. 

Add this mixture to your mixing bowl  with yeast and flour and mix on a low speed for 30 seconds and then on high for 3 minutes . Stir in the remain 2 1/3 cups flour and kneed with the dough hook for 7 minutes.

Put the dough in an oiled bowl (I use my kitchenaid 5 1/2 quart bowl, just lift the dough out, oil the bowl and plop dough back in, cover with a clean tea towel) and let rise for one hour in a warm location.

After the hour, punch it down and roll it out on a lightly floured counter top till it's about one quarter inch thick. You cut the dough into four by four squares and add a large spoonful of the mixture into the middle of each square pull up the four corners and pinch. 

Then you put the balls seems side down on a baking stone or a glass baking pan let rise for another for 30 minutes.

Then you bake them at 375 for 30 minutes or until the golden brown. 

I served these with a sauce that i had warming while they baked. I put 16 ounces of pureed tomatoes or tomato sauce in a pan with 16 oz can of beef consume, some garlic, splash of Worcestershire sauce and salt and pepper.