Syrnyky: The Cheese Pancakes Ukrainians Eat for Breakfast
The UAFest kitchen team
August 2026 · 6 min read
A cooking booth at a past festival in Carleton Place
Syrnyky are the Ukrainian breakfast: fresh cheese mixed with egg and a little flour, shaped into thick discs and fried in butter until the crust turns deep gold. Inside they stay soft, somewhere between a pancake and a cheesecake.
The name comes from syr — cheese. Get the cheese right and the rest of the recipe is twenty minutes of easy work.
The cheese is the whole problem
The traditional cheese is syr, a fresh pressed curd cheese sold in Ukrainian and Polish shops as tvorog, twaróg or farmer cheese. It is dry, crumbly and slightly sour, and it holds its shape in a hot pan.
Canadian ricotta is wetter and sweeter, and pancakes made with it spread and stew. If ricotta is what the shop has, drain it in cheesecloth overnight and add an extra spoon of flour. Dry cottage cheese, pressed through a sieve, works better than either.
Flour, and how little of it
Two tablespoons of flour per 500 g of cheese is enough to bind. More flour makes a sturdier pancake that fries neatly and tastes like a bun; less makes a soft, almost custard interior that needs a careful spatula. Ukrainian cooks argue about this ratio the way they argue about borscht.
Semolina in place of flour is a common variation — it drinks up moisture as the mixture rests, and gives a slightly nubbly texture.
Sweet or savoury
The everyday version carries a spoon of sugar and a handful of raisins, served with sour cream and jam. The savoury version leaves out the sugar and folds in dill and green onion, and it belongs beside soup rather than coffee.
Recipe
Syrnyky (Ukrainian Cheese Pancakes)
Fresh-cheese pancakes fried in butter, crisp outside and soft inside.
- Prep
- 15 minutes
- Cook
- 15 minutes
- Total
- 30 minutes
- Makes
- About 12 pancakes, 4 servings
Ingredients
Pancakes
- 500 g dry farmer cheese (tvorog / twaróg), or well-drained pressed cottage cheese
- 1 egg
- 2 tbsp all-purpose flour, plus more for shaping
- 2 tbsp sugar (leave out for the savoury version)
- Pinch of salt
- 1 tsp vanilla sugar or a scrape of vanilla (optional)
- 50 g raisins, soaked and drained (optional)
To fry and serve
- Butter and a little neutral oil
- Sour cream
- Berry jam, honey or fresh fruit
Method
- 1Press the cheesePush the cheese through a sieve or mash it thoroughly. Lumps of curd become dense pockets in the finished pancake.
- 2MixFold in the egg, flour, sugar, salt and vanilla, plus the raisins if you use them. Stop as soon as the mixture holds together; working it hard makes the pancakes tough.
- 3ShapeWith floured hands roll the mixture into balls the size of a golf ball, flatten to about 2 cm and dust both faces with flour.
- 4FryMelt butter with a little oil over medium-low heat. Fry 3 to 4 minutes a side until deep gold. Low and slow is the rule — high heat burns the crust before the middle warms through.
- 5ServeServe hot with cold sour cream and jam, or with honey and fresh berries.
Notes from the kitchen
- Wet cheese is the usual reason pancakes spread. Drain it overnight in cheesecloth with a weight on top.
- Finish thick syrnyky in a 180 °C oven for 5 minutes rather than pushing the pan heat up.
- They freeze well once fried; reheat in a low oven.
Sweets, coffee and Ukrainian home baking run all afternoon at the festival.
Sunday, September 13, 2026 · 12 PM – 6 PM · Riverside Park, Carleton Place
What people ask
Fresh pressed curd cheese — sold as tvorog, twaróg or farmer cheese. Dry pressed cottage cheese is the closest common substitute in Canada.
Too much moisture in the cheese, or too little binding. Drain the cheese, add a spoon more flour, and let the shaped pancakes rest 10 minutes before frying.
Usually lightly sweet, with sour cream and jam. The savoury version drops the sugar and adds dill and green onion.
Syrnyky are fried on the stove in minutes and eaten hot; a baked cheesecake sets slowly in the oven and is served cold.
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