Pīrāgi is a comforting food for me (Māra Goldsmith)

The pīrāgi recipe that Māra Goldsmith uses every year when baking pīŗāgi for Christmas was passed down to her by Mrs. Arnoldija in Sydney. In this interview, Māra talks about a special trick that makes the dough magical. According to her, it is exactly this that allows you to bake the most delicious pīrāgi in the world!

I wouldn’t offer these to pīrāgi purists! (Maija Hinkle)

The founder of the Latvians Abroad Museum and Research Center museum shares the story of her family’s pīrāgi baking tradition. The Hinkle family includes several vegetarians, so they have had to invent various filling variations that everyone would enjoy. The family’s creative approach to pīrāgi doesn’t stop at the filling – for convenience, they use store-bought bun dough, and a ravioli press is used to shape the pīrāgi!

Pīrāgi as the feeling of home (Līva Ozola)

Līva, a home economics teacher in New Zealand, says that pīrāgi give her a feeling of warmth and home. She has treated her colleagues at school to pīrāgi and has even included making them as an assignment for her students in cooking class…

A Mindful Pīrāgi Making Adventure (Dace Dambergs)

Dace Dambergs has a “”foolproof”” pīrāgi recipe, that she has adapted from Mrs Silmanis’ 1960s recipe for “”Savoury Bacon Rolls””, which she entered in to the iconic Australian women’s magazine “”The Women’s Weekly”” recipe competition, winning a prize. Dace explains: “”The art of making pīrāgi is steeped in Latvian legend and folklore. For centuries grandmothers, mothers and daughters sat around many a table plying their art and chatting about ‘women’s business’. This pīrāgi recipe relies on 21st century ‘mod cons’ making the task somewhat less strenuous and stressful.These include a mixmaster with a dough hook, a microwave, cling wrap, baking paper and an electric blanket. The recipe does however call for a mindful, albeit eastern philosophical approach to the pīrāgi making process.”” The photographs demonstrate step-by-step dough preparation, as prepared by Inga Česlis (Brisbane).

Pīrāgu recipe trials and errors (Amanda Whittaker-Lee)

Amanda, a Canadian married to a Canadian-Latvian, values passing culture on to her daughter, including her husband’s heritage. She had always wanted to try making pīrāgi, and has finally begun the journey of learning and perfecting the recipe. After two unsuccessful, though still delicious, attempts, Amanda turned to the Facebook group “Latvian Favorite Foods,” asking for help, wondering what she was doing wrong, and looking for advice.

The secret ingredient is faith (Inga Lucāns)

Inga shares her many years of experience in baking piparkūkas and pīrāgi. She believes that there are no secrets to making pīrāgi, people shouldn’t be afraid to give it a try, because it’s really not that difficult. However, when it comes to piparkūkas, the secret ingredient, according to Inga, is faith in the dough!

Piparkūku camps in Italy (Ilze Atardo)

For Ilze, piparkūkas has always been a part of Christmas. Now, living in Italy, she organizes piparkūku camps that bring together other Latvians living in Italy, as well as participants from Luxembourg and Germany. For three days they bake, cook food, eat, dance, sing, and simply enjoy being together. In 2023, Ilze received the “Zelta pūka” award for her piparkūka camp.