Groceries in France
Pelmeni and vareniki in France: where to buy them, what they're called, what to use instead
Pelmeni (Russian meat dumplings) are sold in France, but not in ordinary supermarkets: on 6 October 2026 we searched the Auchan, E.Leclerc, Picard, Grand Frais, Biocoop and Naturalia websites and found not one pack. The quickest route is a Russian or Armenian shop; the South has them from Toulouse to Nice.
We checked the chains, the Open Food Facts label database, and the catalogues and websites of Russian and Armenian shops in the South on 6 October 2026, then went back over the online shops on 17 October, product pages and delivery pages alike.
Are there pelmeni in France, and what are they called?
There are, and the name barely changes: packs say Pelmeni, and the French part of the label says “raviolis” with a filling. French cooking websites call them raviolis russes. Pelmeni have no French equivalent of their own, and in the ordinary chains we didn’t find a single pack you could actually buy.
| As printed on the pack | What it is | Good for |
|---|---|---|
| Pelmeni | Pelmeni under their own name, written just like that on the pack, sometimes the French way: Pelméni. Inside is raw pork-and-beef mince with onion, and they’re sold frozen. | The real thing. Look in a Russian or Armenian shop: on 6 October 2026 you couldn’t buy them on the ordinary chains’ websites. |
| Raviolis à la viande de porc et de bœuf, surgelé | What the French part of the Germes label calls its pelmeni: frozen ravioli with pork and beef. | Recognising the pack when there’s no Russian word in sight. |
| Ravioli russe, raviolis russes | How French cooking websites explain pelmeni to the French, and how Russian and Armenian shops label them in French in their catalogues. | Asking the staff in a specialist shop. In a supermarket these words won’t find you anything. |
| Vareniki, varenyky | Vareniki. Often explained as raviolis farcis, and the end of the name gives away the filling: à la cerise, au pomme de terre, au fromage frais, à la choucroute. | The real thing. We didn’t find them in the chains. |
| Pierogi | Polish vareniki: the same half-moon shape, the same fillings. Pierogi ruskie (“à la russe” in French) are vareniki with potato and tvorog, not Russian pelmeni. | Same as vareniki: ruskie with potato and tvorog, z kapustą i grzybami with cabbage and mushrooms. |
| Gyoza | Japanese dumplings, sold in almost every chain. The dough is similar, but half the filling is vegetables, with ginger, soy and sesame oil. They’re fried. | A quick supper when the Russian shop is a long way off. The taste is Asian. |
| Tortellini à la viande | Italian pasta with meat. Egg dough, and meat makes up about 11% of the weight, roughly a third of what Germes pelmeni have. | A broth “with pelmeni”, at a pinch. |
| Ravioli pur bœuf | Tinned ravioli in tomato sauce, from Panzani and the own brands of nearly every chain. Panzani lists “viande de bœuf 4 %” in the filling. | No stand-in for pelmeni. |
| Khinkali | Georgian khinkali: big and pleated, with a little topknot, meat and broth inside. You eat them with your hands. | A dish in its own right, not a pelmeni substitute. |
| Manti | Turkish manti: tiny meat dumplings, boiled and served with yoghurt and garlic. They also come dried, like pasta. | All they share with the big steamed manti we know is the name. |
The main trap is the word ravioli. In a French shop it means Italian ravioli, and only a qualifier gives pelmeni away: russe, à la viande de porc et de bœuf, the Germes or Sibirjak brand, or the shop itself. The French text on a Germes pack spells it out: “Raviolis à la viande de porc et de bœuf, surgelé”.
On 6 October the Open Food Facts database, where users add labels themselves, held 13 packs of pelmeni marked as sold in France. Ten have barcodes from the German range (six of them Germes), two Latvian ones, one something else. Not one of them names a shop.
The only chain listing we found was in the Super U, Hyper U and U Express online catalogue: a 1 kg bag of Germes from the wholesaler ARMENDIS. You couldn’t order it that day; it was marked “Bientôt disponible” (coming soon). What that listing does show nicely is why you read the ingredients rather than the name. The name says “porc et dinde”, pork and turkey. The ingredients further down give the filling as 56%, with pork at 52% and beef at 16%.
How do you recognise the pack, and how much meat is in it?
The share of filling is printed right on the pack. Germes “Zastolni” 1 kg is 58% dough (wheat flour, water, rapeseed oil, salt) and 42% filling: pork, beef, onion. Packs usually come in 400-500 g, 800 g or 1 kg, and at Anahit in Marseille you’ll also find 2 kg bags.
The Germes pack with French text gives these instructions: drop the frozen pelmeni into 3 litres of boiling salted water, wait until they float, then cook for another 6-7 minutes over a medium heat. Serve with a knob of butter or with smetana (Russian sour cream). Once they’ve thawed, don’t put them back in the freezer: the label says that too.
And what are vareniki called?
It varies. Packs say vareniki or varenyky, but in Russian and Armenian shops it’s more often plain ravioli, and then the second word tells you the filling:
- “Ravioli à la cerise”: cherry;
- “Ravioli au pomme de terre”: potato;
- “Ravioli farcie au fromage frais”: tvorog (farmer’s cheese);
- “Ravioli à la choucroute”: sauerkraut.
Polish pierogi are essentially the same dish. Just don’t confuse pierogi ruskie (“à la russe” in French) with Russian pelmeni: they’re vareniki with potato, tvorog and onion.
What can you use instead of pelmeni, and when doesn’t the swap work?
There’s no proper substitute in an ordinary supermarket. Frozen gyoza come closest, tortellini à la viande will do for a broth, and tinned ravioli you should skip altogether. If it has to be real pelmeni, that means a Russian shop or making them yourself.
Gyoza are in almost every chain: on the Auchan, E.Leclerc and Picard websites, and according to Open Food Facts also at Carrefour, Intermarché, U, Monoprix, Lidl, Leader Price and Thiriet. The dough is close to ours, flour and water. But Ajinomoto “Gyoza porc” (20 pieces, 400 g, in Auchan’s Surgelés section) lists white cabbage first, pork at 22%, then sesame oil, ginger and soy sauce. And they’re cooked in a frying pan: Picard says to fry them on one side for 2 minutes in 3 spoonfuls of oil, pour in 100 ml of water, cover for about four minutes and let the water cook off. You end up with something like fried pelmeni, but the taste is Asian all the same.
Tortellini à la viande are only good in a broth. The dough is egg pasta, and meat is about 11% of the weight: Lidl’s Chef Select has 6.5% beef and 4.5% pork, Carrefour’s has cooked ham, mortadella and cured ham, plus breadcrumbs. Germes pelmeni have roughly three times as much meat.
Ravioli pur bœuf in a tin: don’t. It’s a ready meal in tomato sauce with durum wheat pasta, and Panzani’s filling lists “viande de bœuf 4 %”, next to breadcrumbs, carrot and onion. Neither the taste nor the texture is anything like pelmeni.
Khinkali won’t do as a substitute either. They’re a dish of their own: big, with broth inside, eaten by hand while you hold the little topknot. But they’re sold in the same places as pelmeni: at Épicerie Arménie in Montpellier and at Anahit in Marseille (Viči, 400 g, pre-cooked and frozen). Turkish manti from a packet are tiny, boiled and eaten with yoghurt and garlic. With our big steamed manti they have just one thing in common, the name.
If there’s no shop anywhere near you, you’re left with making them. For the dough, flour (farine), egg, water and salt are enough; for the filling, half beef and half pork mince, onion and garlic. For vareniki with tvorog, use thick faisselle: ordinary runny fromage blanc will leak (more in the tvorog guide).
How much do pelmeni and vareniki cost in France?
A rough figure for 2026: about €9 a kilo. Pelmeni run from €6 to €15 (24 prices from 4 shops), and vareniki also come to about €9 (13 prices from 4 shops). These are catalogue prices from online shops selling Russian food, as of 17 October 2026, delivery not included. No shop confirms frozen delivery to the South, so don’t read them as delivered prices. Shop prices change, so take this as a ballpark rather than a price list.
Where can you buy pelmeni and vareniki in the South of France?
In Russian and Armenian shops, and at the Eastern European chain Mix Markt. Going by shop websites, reviews and our chat, pelmeni or vareniki are confirmed in eight cities across the South, from Toulouse to Nice, and Mix Markt says on its website that pelmeni are part of its range. Let’s start with our home base.
Montpellier. Épicerie Arménie at 5 rue Anatole France is a community partner, and we shop there ourselves. Pelmeni and khinkali are in the freezer: that’s how the shop’s owner described the range in September 2026. Then there’s Épicerie Victoria at 6 rue Fontenille. On 19 July 2025 the shop itself announced its opening in our chat, and the post said: “Already on sale: everything for borscht, pelmeni, herring under a fur coat.” Some of us went on day one and came back praising the prices. Opening hours and the nearest tram stops are on the Russian shops in Montpellier page.
Nice. This is where you’ll find the most shops with confirmed pelmeni. At Ani Mini Market (5 avenue de la Californie, tram to Magnan) the frozen section of the website listed 13 products on 6 October, among them Sibirskie XXL, Zastolnye, Moya Semja and “Macha et Michka” pelmeni, cabbage and cherry vareniki, and Polish Polsmak pierogi with beef and pork. For some reason the cherry vareniki are described as “Raviolis à la fraise” (strawberry), so check the filling in the shop.
Avrora Market (29 rue Arson) says it has a big choice of frozen food, “notamment pelmeni”. Gastronomie Russe (Gastronom, 4-6 boulevard Gambetta) has pelmeni too. Mix Markt has two shops in Nice, at 122-124 boulevard Gambetta and 50 boulevard de Riquier, and one more in Villeneuve-Loubet, at 2594 Route Nationale 7. Hours and stops are on the Russian shops in Nice page.
Marseille. Anahit has two shops: 11-13 boulevard de la Liberté and 165 boulevard de Pont de Vivaux. Its catalogue has a frozen section of its own, “Ravioli & Pelmeni”, which held 18 items on 6 October: Germes “Zastolni” pelmeni in 1 kg bags, Germes cherry and potato vareniki in 450 g, Sibirjak tvorog and cabbage vareniki in 800 g, khinkali and Turkish manti. Another Mix Markt stands at Plan de Campagne (Les Pennes-Mirabeau), just outside Marseille. Marseille doesn’t have a page of its own yet; the addresses are in the directory of Russian shops in the South.
Toulouse. Suzanna Épicerie Russe et Pays de l’Est (143 rue du Faubourg Bonnefoy) says on its website: “Nous proposons des pelmenis (raviolis russe)”. But the site hasn’t been updated since November 2019, so that’s the shop describing itself, not proof of what’s in stock today: ask in the chat before you go. The city’s other shops are on the Russian shops in Toulouse page.
Perpignan, Nîmes, Avignon, Toulon. In Perpignan, Alenka (35 boulevard Félix Mercader) has pelmeni, as a review from 8 January 2026 mentions. In Avignon, if a review from 18 November 2024 is to be believed, Épicerie Matriochka (17 boulevard Sixte Isnard) is the only place in town where you’ll find pierogi. In Nîmes, try Matrochka (41 boulevard Gambetta); in Toulon, Inter Market (6 place Gambetta) and Katuscha (131 avenue François Cuzin), not to be confused with Katucha, the online shop in Metz (more on that below). Hours, where known, are in the directory as well.
And the ordinary supermarket? On 6 October a search for “pelmeni” on the Auchan, E.Leclerc, Picard, Grand Frais, Biocoop and Naturalia websites didn’t find a single pack. Vareniki, same thing: searching for vareniki and pierogi at Auchan, E.Leclerc, Picard and Grand Frais came up empty, apart from a pierogi recipe book at E.Leclerc. Lidl’s online catalogue answered “pelmeni” with onigiri, lardons, kiwis and even clothes. The only lookalikes in the chains are gyoza and tortellini, covered above.
Can you order pelmeni for delivery in France?
You can, but frozen food by post is complicated: no shop confirms frozen delivery to the South. Katucha doesn’t post frozen goods, AKHTAMAR and NurSupermarket have no rules for frozen food on their websites, and Anahit delivers within its zone around Marseille.
AKHTAMAR (Strasbourg) ships across mainland France. On 17 October 2026 the catalogue had a range of pelmeni and vareniki, for example “PELMENI SIBERIENNES 1 KG BEST TIME” and “VARENIKI UKRAINKA PDT 500G”. How the bag is supposed to reach you still cold isn’t explained anywhere, though: the terms of sale on the site are still an unfilled template, and frozen delivery is unconfirmed. The rate on 6 October, from a test basket, was about €5 up to 2 kg, free from €100. That day the site accepted a basket with one 1 kg bag of pelmeni for the same €5 and gave no warning whatsoever; we can’t repeat that today, because the site has shut its basket to robots. Write to the shop before an order like that.
NurSupermarket (Meudon, outside Paris). The site says “Partout en France”, and its catalogue has a frozen section with pelmeni, vareniki and khinkali. On frozen delivery it offers only a general note that fresh and frozen goods may come with special conditions, so frozen delivery is unconfirmed. The rate is worked out in the basket.
Katucha (Metz) ships by Colissimo across France, up to 20 kg per order, and it does have pelmeni: Sibirskie with pork and beef, and potato vareniki. The catch is that Metz is a very long way from the South, and the shop doesn’t post frozen goods. The product page says “les produits surgelés sont disponible uniquement pour la ville de Metz”, and the delivery page “le surgelé ne peut être livré que par la livraison locale ou récupéré au point de retrait”. In other words, pelmeni are delivered only within the city of Metz or collected in person.
Anahit (Marseille) does its own deliveries, frozen food included, but only within 10 km of the towns on its list: Marseille, Vitrolles, La Ciotat, Toulon, Draguignan, Fréjus, Cannes, Nice, Gardanne, Aix, Salon-de-Provence and Martigues. At checkout on 6 October Marseille was the only delivery option, and Montpellier and Occitanie aren’t on the list. The rate that day was €10 per order, free from €100; these days it only appears after you fill in the delivery form, so we haven’t rechecked it. We tested the threshold with pelmeni: on 6 October, 17 one-kilo bags of Germes “Zastolni” took the basket past €100, and the “Frais de transport” line showed €0.00. An option for people in Marseille with a big freezer.
Be careful with older lists. Slavmarket (Paris) publishes no prices on its site, orders go only through the pomo.bio marketplace, and the marketplace gives the delivery area as Paris and Île-de-France. La Maison Russe has no frozen food in its catalogue at all. One site has become a blog about travel and visas to Russia, another no longer loads, and at Château Russe 506 of the 507 products are priced at €0.00. The online shop Prestige Russe had orders suspended on 6 October, while its home page carries an undated banner saying it delivers all over France.
So for pelmeni it’s easier to drop into a shop when you’re in a big city, and take a cool bag with you. And you can always ask in the chat whether anyone is heading there before you.
What we couldn’t check
The Carrefour and Intermarché websites don’t let automated checks through, and Aldi’s search only works in a browser. So for these three chains we’re judging indirectly: Open Food Facts doesn’t give any of them as a shop for a single pack of pelmeni, vareniki or pierogi. We didn’t walk the aisles of particular supermarkets in the South either. And pierogi at the Polish shop Delicepol in Marseille (5 place Pierre Roux) couldn’t be confirmed: the business register lists it as active, but no source we could reach mentions pierogi.
If you spot a pack of pelmeni in your local Intermarché, or notice that a shop on the list has closed, write to the Vibe South of France community chat on Telegram and we’ll update the page.