Hungarian Goulash

[mercyteapot]

Make in a heavy 6 to 8 quart pot:

Fat rendered from 2 strips of bacon (remove bacon from pan)
2 onions, medium dice
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 1/2 pounds stewing beef, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 garlic clove, crushed
Pinch caraway seeds
2 tablespoons good quality sweet paprika (see cook's note)
2 cups (appx) warm water
2 cubes beef bouillon
2 whole canned tomatoes, chopped into 1 inch pieces (or just use about 1/2 cup canned diced tomatoes)
1 chopped green bell pepper
4 or 5 potatoes red potatoes, peeled and cubed
2 tablespoons sour cream, plus more for plating
1 pound prepared spaetzle, as an accompaniment
Cucumber salad, as an accompaniment (recipes follow)

Saute onions in the bacon fat until translucent. Add the beef and saute with the onions for about 10 minutes, covered, until the meat is browned.

Add garlic and caraway seed to meat and onions. Remove pot from heat. Stir in paprika rapidly with a wooden spoon. Immediately after paprika is absorbed, add the warm water to just cover the meat, leaving room for potatoes. Add beef bouillon cubes. Cover and cook over low heat for about 1 hour.

After 1 hour of braising, add the tomatoes and green pepper. Add a little more water if necessary and more salt to taste. Simmer slowly for another 30 minutes. Add potatoes, and cook another 30 minutes until the potatoes are fork tender. Stir the sour cream into a cup of the goulash and add to the rest of the goulash. Serve with spaetzle and add extra sour cream to each plate.

[Dave Hutchins]

A little different from mine but sounds very good

[mercyteapot]

It's very different from what I knew as goulash when I was growing up. That was a dish made with elbow macaroni and ground beef. I like this much better.

[Andy M.]

This recipe is more like the real thing.

The macaroni and hamburg 'goulash' is a dish we call American chop Suey. It is also called slumgullion in parts of the country.

My goulash recipe does not include potato or bell pepper and I use tomato paste rather than tomato. We just had a batch of it last weekend.

[mitmondol]

I know, this is an old post. Too bad I did not see it sooner.
Actually this is a mix between gulyas soup and gulyas (this is the correct spelling), that is called porkolt, really.
If it is the stew type, no potatoes in it.
If it is the soup type, potatoes and carrots and also little spaetzle-type dumplings go in it.
Also, no sour cream in the soup!
This recipe is surprisingly close to the real thing though and sounds very nice.

"Goulash" can be anything...

[jennyema]

Where is the cucumber salad recipe?