This is a Hungarian Goulash that I made a few weeks ago. It has carrots, beef, onions, paprika , tomato paste, roasted red bell peppers, and mushrooms in it as its main ingredients. Yes the paprika counts as a main ingredient and not a spice in this dish because there is so much of it. The main spices in this dish besides the paprika are dill and caraway seeds. This dish comes from Hungary and was originally called Gulyas and was made by shepherds, which is what that word means.
In this picture the Goulash has sour cream on it and is on a bed of white rice. It is normally served with potatoes, not rice, but I thought it would be fun to make it with rice. The caraway seeds and dill are already in it so there is no need to sprinkle more on top but you can if you want a little more color.
There is an Austrian variation but the sauce is much thinner and contains green non-roasted bell peppers . It can have a fried egg on top of it and sliced pickles in this version.
The American dish has very little in common with this, being a closer cousin of Chipped Beef on Toast (SOS, ground beef Stroganoff) or Macaroni and Cheese.
Goulash recipe- takes around four hours, prep time one hour, cook time 2 1/2 to 3 hours.
1 tbsp clarified butter or lard
6 to 8 yellow onions depending on the size of the onion, I tend to go for around 7 if they are mostly medium size with one small one.
1/2 cup paprika
6 lbs beef- usually chuck works best
8 carrots
1/2 cup white mushrooms
1 jar of roasted red peppers
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp caraway seeds
1 tsp dried dill
2 cups low sodium beef broth
salt and pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 320 F.
Melt the butter or lard in a Dutch oven. Thinly slice the onions while the butter or lard is melting. Caramelize the onions, adding salt as you do so to let the liquid seep out. Add the paprika and stir rapidly. This should take around five minutes. Do not burn the paprika.
While the onions are caramelizing, dice the roasted red peppers, slice or quarter the mushrooms and cut the beef and carrots into 1 inch pieces.
Add the beef, carrots, mushrooms and the roasted red peppers to the onions and paprika.
Stir in the tomato paste , dill and caraway seeds. Add salt and pepper.
Put Dutch oven into the preheated oven, lid on.
Cook for 2 hours, lid on, stirring every thirty minutes.
Add beef broth when the 2 hours have passed and then cook for thirty minutes to an hour more depending on the toughness of the meat and how much the vegetables are cooked. At this point the lid can be left slightly ajar if you want the sauce to get thicker.
After the thirty minutes to an hour are up, check for seasonings and adjust as needed.
Serve with boiled potatoes or rice, preferably garnished with sour cream.
Works Cited
The Cooking of Vienna’s Empire by Joseph Wechsberg, published 1968
Cook’s Illustrated Cookbook, 2011 Edition.
Em's Eclectic Eats 