Of course she has a family recipe to share!
This Is Martha Stewart’s Secret All-Time Favorite Food
Updated on Feb. 10, 2025
Martha Stewart grew up in a Polish family, often cooking with her mother, Big Martha. Her mom regularly made pierogi, simple dumplings filled with potato filling. To this day, Big Martha’s trusted recipe for pierogi is a favorite for the caterer-turned-author-turned-entrepreneur.
“I am often asked: What is your favorite food? Although I always answer Japanese, the real response should be and is pierogi, the delectable Polish dumplings that my mother, Big Martha, made so well in many incarnations: potato, cabbage, blueberry, peach, plum and apricot,” Martha says on Instagram.
That recipe has one unexpected ingredient that can’t be skipped.
What is Martha’s secret ingredient?
It’s brown butter. Traditional pierogi are filled with potato and cheese, then are cooked in boiling water and served with salt and melted butter. Using brown butter instead of plain melted butter lends rich, toasty notes that elevate the humble dumplings. In her recipe for Pierogi with Potato Filling and Brown Butter, the brown butter is treated like a finishing sauce, drizzled over the cooked dumplings to add flavor.
Like Martha says, you don’t have to eat all the butter. It has a functional purpose, too: It keeps the steamy, starchy pierogi from sticking together.
How do you make brown butter?
It sounds like an elegant upgrade, but it’s not hard to execute. Just melt unsalted butter in a saucepan over low or medium heat, stirring gently with a rubber spatula or whisk. The butter will take on a progressively darker hue and then turn golden brown. This happens because the milk solids separate from the butterfat and begin to toast.
All those toasty bits add flavor, so while you’re welcome to strain them out before serving, it’s often beneficial to leave them in. Besides, when incorporating brown butter into something like chocolate chip cookie dough, the brown speckles are less visible in the final product anyway.
Next Up: What I Can’t Stop Thinking About After Watching Martha Stewart’s Documentary
