Finnish Cuisine Delicacy II: Karelian pasty

Yup, continueing my crusade pro Finnish oddities with Karelian pasty (karjalanpiirakka/karelian pirog) this time. It is one of the few Finnish traditional foods that is popular all over Finland, even outside our borders. Hell, you can eat them in the infamous Finland boats (knullbåtar, you know). It comes from Karelia, (South-)Eastern part of Finland (parts of Karelia also belong to Russia). More about the pasty itself from here.

Basically it's a rhye paste filled with rice porridge and baked in an oven. You can have it also with smashed potato or carrot filling which taste good as well. You don't need to add anything on the top of the pasty when you eat it, but it's common to put some butter or eggbutter on it (like the one in the picture). That makes it even tastier but unhealthier. Needless to mention that I ate it anyway...

Karelian pasty serves as a good snack, but normally you don't eat them to fill your belly. Although it's quite filling stuff. They are pretty laborious (jobbigt, as a Swede would put it) to make, so it's normal that a few people gather around to make a large amount of them. Kind of setting up a small factory. It's not the same thing to eat industrially manufactured pasties (it rarely is), but they are usually quite alright too.