Hey all! Wanderfood Wednesday is back after a short vacation cooling her heels. Please join me every Wednesday for some link-love and lets share our favorite food stories, recipes, restaurants, experiences, whatever strikes your fancy! Share the link to your food themed Wednesday post using the form at the bottom of this page. I look forward to expanding the WanderFood community!
We finally have had some weather resembling winter here in the Bay Area — (I can practically hear the rest of the country rolling in the aisles…). But while everywhere else has been suffering from horrendous snow and ice storms, we’ve actually been in a drought! So the rain these past few days has been very welcome.
In honor of winter, I thought I’d make one of my favorite wintertime dishes: beef stew. I took inspiration for this recipe from one of my most treasured travel souvenirs, a Hungarian cookbook obtained during my time studying abroad there.
Hungarian cooking is a bit like you might expect. Hearty, strong, and not exactly big on the finesse, they are dishes born of a long, very harsh history. But the culture is a strong one and very proud; and Hungarian cuisine reflects this.
I adapted the following recipe from the one my Hungarian cookbook, entitled The Traditional Hungarian Kitchen, by Vince Kiado.
Hungarian Beef Stew (Marhaporkolt)
- 1 3/4 lb shank, blade or rump of beef
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 1 3/4 oz lard (I used butter)
- 1-2 green peppers, diced
- 1 tomato, diced
- Salt, to taste
- 1 teaspoon paprika
My additions:
- 1 carrot, chopped into thick slices
- 4 large white mushrooms, chopped
- 4 small potatoes, quartered (I used yukon, it’s really up to you!)
- Red wine
Directions
1. Brown the meat and set aside. This helps lock in the juices and lets the meat get super tender during the cooking.
2. In a large stew pot, sauté the onion, carrot and potato in lard (or butter) for 1-2 minutes.
3. Add the meat, green pepper, tomato, mushroom and salt. Stir and add a little water. I found that I really didn’t need much at all, and you can add more as you go if you feel you need to. I think I probably started with about 1/4 cup water.
4. Cover and let cook on low heat for 1 hour.
5. After 1 hour, lift lid and stir. Add the paprika and 1/2 cup red wine, cover and cook for another hour on low heat.
6. Take off heat and serve.
Depending on the type of stew meat you get, 2 1/2 hours cooking time might work better, but I found that 2 hours was plenty of time.
Do you have a favorite wintertime dish? Share your thoughts in the comment section below! And if you have a blog and would like to participate in WanderFood Wednesday, simply write a food-themed post, on Wednesdays, and link to it here. Look forward to hearing from you, fellow foodies!
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