While mostly women make pelmeni, men and the entire family become involved in the process when the dumplings are made in large amounts. In this case, women make the dough and prepare the meat and men do the folding (Chamberlain 228). During Siberian winters, women of the household make pelmeni, which are then put on planks outside in the cold to freeze. Once the dumplings are frozen, they are put in goatskin bags and hung in cold rooms (Culinaria 133). A more primitive way of freezing pelmeni involves throwing them out of the kitchen window straight into the snow (Jones 165). The reason pelmeni are frozen is because the dumplings can be kept that way for long periods of time with little loss of quality or flavor (“Pelmeni”).
