Finnish Fried Yeast Pies with Meat and Rice

Melt the butter and let it cool. Gently warm the milk until lukewarm, not hot. Crumble the yeast into it, add the sugar and mix. Add 450 g flour, 6 g salt and the whole egg, then start kneading. Pour in the butter and knead for about 8–10 minutes, until smooth, elastic and soft, slightly tacky but pulling away from the bowl. Cover and leave in a warm place for about 45–60 minutes, until roughly doubled in volume.

While the dough rises, put the rice in a small saucepan and add 150 ml water. Bring to a boil, cover and cook over low heat for about 15–18 minutes, until the grains are tender and have absorbed the water. If liquid remains at the bottom, briefly cook without a lid to evaporate it. Remove from the heat and leave covered for 5 minutes. Do not drain the rice; all of it goes into the filling.

Prepare the meat while the rice cooks. Finely chop the onion. Heat 15 ml oil in a skillet, add the onion and cook for about 4–5 minutes until softened. Add the beef and cook for about 8–10 minutes, breaking it up frequently with a spatula; it must be fully cooked, without raw clumps. Season with 4 g salt and the pepper, then evaporate any free liquid. Mix the entire contents of the skillet, including the remaining fat, with all the rice. Spread the filling thinly on a large plate and cool for about 20–30 minutes, until no longer warm; do this during the dough's first rise.

Gently press down the risen dough and divide into 12 equal pieces. Lightly dust the work surface and rolling pin using the 30 g flour set aside for dusting. Roll each piece into a round about 14 cm across and about 4–5 mm thick. Keep waiting dough pieces and rolled rounds under a light cloth so the edges do not dry out. Dust sparingly so the edges do not become thickly coated in flour. Discard the remaining dusting flour.

Divide all the cool filling among the 12 rounds, placing it on one half and leaving a border of about 1.5 cm. Moisten the edges with a little of the prepared 20 ml water. Fold the rounds in half, press out air around the filling and seal the edges firmly, then crimp with a fork. Discard unused water. Place the pies separately on parchment paper, cover with a light cloth and leave for about 20 minutes, until slightly puffed.

Toward the end of the second rise, pour 1.5 l oil into a heavy pot about 22–24 cm in diameter with a capacity of at least 5 l. The oil will be about 3–4 cm deep. Do not fill the pot above half its height. Heat the oil to about 170–180°C. A pie should sizzle evenly as soon as it enters the oil, but the oil should not smoke.

Carefully add two pies at a time, leaving room for them to float freely; fry six batches in total. Fry for about 3 minutes on one side and about 3 minutes on the other, until evenly browned. Adjust the heat to maintain a gentle sizzle and let the oil reheat between batches. After the first batch, wait about 2 minutes and cut one pie open: the dough next to the filling should be fluffy and cooked through, without a raw, sticky layer. If the center is still sticky, finish the first batch, including the cut halves, on a baking sheet in an oven preheated to 160°C for about 8–10 minutes, until the dough is cooked through. Then lower the heat under the oil and fry later batches a little longer; the total time may increase. If only one pie fits in the pot, fry individually and allow for a longer total frying time.

Lift the pies out with a slotted spoon onto a rack set over a plate and leave for about 10 minutes to drain and cool slightly. Early batches can rest while later ones fry. Serve two pies per portion, with all their filling. Once cool, discard the oil left in the pot and collected beneath the rack.