It's been a long time since I made it, but many years ago, when I got some fantastic paprika, the best I had ever gotten, up to that time, at Paprika Weiss - an iconic store on NYs upper east side. I had fewer cookbooks back then, but I got some good recipes from the old NYT books, and the recipes reminded me of chili, with freshly ground chili powder. Looking through those recipes, I see that I tried a lot of them! All of them had a lot of onions, an herb used in many was marjoram, combined with a smaller amount of thyme, in one recipe. Most had some chopped green bell peppers - probably because reds were not as available, back then, but I'd use reds, when I could get them. One recipe had a small veal kidney, to 3 lbs beef, which my note in the margin said that "the kidney gives a delicious flavor, different from other goulash". I had forgotten that one, but the one I remembered was the recipe that had caraway seed in it, which seemed strange, at first, but not when you think about cumin in chili, the flavor is unique, and delicious. I found that the browning of the meat shouldn't be as dark as a basic beef bourguignon, FI, and this is probably why some weren't even browned.
So here is the other goulash - my tweaked recipe, that I wrote in my Blue Book:
Hungarian Goulash
3 lbs beef chuck, cut in 1 1/2" cubes
salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 tb vegetable oil
2 cups chopped onions
1 tb minced garlic
1 tb tomato paste
4 tb sweet paprika
cayenne to taste (option)
1 tb caraway seeds, lightly crushed in mortar
1 tb dried marjoram, lightly crushed in mortar
1 c beef broth
one 14½ oz can crushed tomatoes
2 large, or 3 medium red bell peppers, cut into
2" x 1/4" strips
A. Preheat oven to 300°. Heat 3 tb oil in a large Dutch oven, over med high. Salt meat, and add to pan in a loose layer, and lightly brown meat, stirring around several times. Remove to a plate as it browns, adding more, adding oil, if necessary, and when all is browned, add onion, reduce heat to medium, and only about 3-4 min. Add tomato paste and garlic, and cook, stirring, about a minute. Add paprika, caraway, and marjoram, and cook a few minutes, stirring constantly. Add tomatoes and broth, and stir and scrape fond from the pan. Return meat to the pan, stir to coat, and bring to a simmer. Add black pepper to taste (usually about 3/4 tsp for me) and cayenne, if using. Cover the pan, and place in oven. Cook 1 1/2 hrs.
B. Remove pot from oven and stir peppers in. Place back in oven, and cook another 45 minutes. Adjust the salt, and peppers, and serve.