Click picture to enlarge.
Hungarian Goulash was cooked as early as 800 A.D. by Magyars. They used a large
cauldron (a bográc in Hungarian) and cooked over an open fire. So
goulash is a meal with a history!
There are several meats which can be used in place of
beef (mutton and chicken are common) and seasonal vegetables are added.
Onions, pepper and wine are additional essentials to this heart-warming dish.
KEY POINTS
Preparation Time:
Cooking Time:
How Difficult
Medium
Freeze?
Yes
Servings
4 portions
INGREDIENTS For illustration
only, rely on ingredients list below
Metric
Imperial
450 g braising steak
1 lb braising steak
1 medium onion
2 medium old potatoes
50 g flour (any type)
2 oz flour (any type)
Small can (app. 200 g)
chopped tomatoes
Small can (app. 7 oz)
chopped tomatoes
1 medium red pepper
3 tablespoons olive oil
½ level teaspoon freshly ground black
pepper
1 garlic clove
¾ teaspoon ground paprika (the commoner sweet type)
¼ teaspoon ground mixed spice or cinnamon
Beef stock cube
dissolved in small amount of hot water (app.
½ cup)
100 ml red wine
3 fl oz red wine
½
teaspoon dried mixed herbs
Preparation Before Cooking Trim the beef and chop into roughly 2 cm (1 inch)
cubes.
Remove the seeds and pith from the red pepper and slice into 4
pieces.
Thinly slice and chop the onions.
Peel and chop the potatoes into roughly 2 cm (1 inch) cubes.
Slice and crush the garlic.
Pre heat the oven to 180°C / 350°F / Gas Mark 4.
Special Cooking Equipment
Oven proof casserole dish.
Frying pan.
COOK'S NOTES
This recipe is an English version of goulash.
In recent traditional Hungarian cooking, goulash (gulyas) is more liquid than in
this recipe and is in fact a chunky soup. If you wish to eat this dish as
a soup, add a cup full of water to the casserole dish.
Place the flour and pepper in a bowl, add the beef cubes and roll them around until they
are well coated with the flour mixture.
Add 2 tablespoons of olive oil to the frying pan, warm to a medium heat and
add the flour-coated beef cubes. Fry for about 3 minutes, stirring continuously to
ensure the beef is browned on all side. Place the beef to one side.
Add the one remaining tablespoon of olive oil to the frying pan and
fry the onions and garlic on a medium heat until they are softened. This
will take around 2 minutes.
Keep stirring the onions while they are frying to ensure that they
are cooked evenly. Savour the delicious aroma of frying onions!
Add the onions, beef cubes, potato cubes, chopped tomatoes, garlic, paprika, stock, ground spice, wine and herbs to the casserole
dish. Give it all a good stir to mix evenly.
Cover the casserole dish,
place it in the pre-heated oven (180°C / 350°F / Gas Mark 4) and cook for 2 hours or until the beef is
tender. If using chicken instead of beef, cook for an hour.
Half way through the cooking process, remove the casserole from the
oven and give the ingredients a good stir. This will stop anything
sticking to the bottom of the casserole dish and at the same time will ensure
that all the flavours of the dish are spread evenly.
20 minutes before the goulash
is cooked, place the quartered peppers under a medium heat grill (skin
side upwards) for about 10 minutes until the skin is
blistered.
Take the peppers away from the grill and allow them to cool for 5
minutes. Peel the skin away and slice the peeled peppers into thin strips
(enlarge the picture on the left for an idea of size)
After two hours or so of cooking (longer if you want to tenderise the meat), take the casserole from the oven, place the sliced peppers on the top of
the goulash and place the covered casserole dish back in the oven for
another 5 minutes.
Goulash can be served with any vegetables you fancy, we chose to keep it
simple with a portion of long grain and wild rice.
With the amount of
pepper used with the flour this goulash will be mildly peppery. Maybe next
time you will use more or less pepper depending on how spicey you like
your food.
