Today is independence day in Finland. It’s quite common for families to eat someting fancy in celebration of this, and even though any level of nationalism is far removed from us, we decided to make something nice today as well. To celebrate the history of modern Finland, we took a bit from Sweden, a bit from Russia and added something indigenous to Finland. Sums the story of our nation quite nicely and makes a wonderful meal.
The main dish is from Sweden, it’s called pitepalt, a filled dumpling. The recipe was borrowed from our western friends, the great Cooking vegan food up north blog. We ate the pitepalt with Italian salad, which is actually a Russian salad, and lingonberries.
The dessert was more Finnish. Bilberry kukko is like a bilberry pie, but it has crust on top and berries under it. It’s originally from Savo, but nowadays it’s eaten all over Finland.
Bilberry Kukko
Filling:
2-2,5 l bilberries or blueberries
0,75 dl sugar
2 tbsp potato flour
Crust:
250 g margarine
1,75 dl sugar
5,25 dl rye flour
2 tsp baking powder
vegan vanilla ice cream for serving
Mix the filling ingredients together. Grease an oven proof dish and put the filling in it. Beat the margarine and sugar in a bowl. Add the flour and baking powder and mix together. Cover the dish with the crust. I use my hands to make it flat, but you can also roll it on the table and then put on top of the dish. Bake in 200 Celsius degrees 40 minutes or until it’s nicely browned. Serve with vanilla ice cream.
Elitefood 
What an awesome meal! I will have to try that salad. I love how you combined food from Sweden, Finland and Russia. That’s what a celebration like that should be all about. Thanks for using my recipe as well, did you like it? This post reminded me that I should make pitepalt soon again.
We loved your recipe, easy to make and very, VERY filling!
The first batch I tried ended up a bit bland, because I guess I was afraid of putting too much salt on the boiling water, and corrected the mistake for the second batch. (Half of the amount I made are now in the freezer for future use…)
I’m sure to try pitepalt again in the future and do some experimenting with the fillings. Tofu spinach pitepalt, anyone? 😉