With Winter in full swing, and seasons of mellow fruitfulness long gone, we look to warming classics to sustain us. Here then is the best of them to warm you after a muddy walk through frosty fields.
Oozing with meaty goodness, and a sauce to die for, this comfort food can compete with any à là carte dish, and what's more it improves with age, so can be made the day before or eaten several days in a row, with crusty bread, rice or noodles, whatever takes your fancy or fits with your budget and appetite.
This recipe is very easy to make because there are only a few steps to it, and you will not need to prepare many elements either. I usually manage to get the whole thing prepped and into the oven in around 15 mins, after which it just cooks low-and-slow, with enough time to lay the table and make a starter or dessert.
Good cooks do it the day before
If, like me, you like to arrive looking fresh and energised for your guests, then preparing one of the dinner courses the day before makes sense and this is a perfect choice for that. As I am always on the look-out for just such dishes, my recipe archive contains a significant number of dishes which fall into this forgiving category, and I heartily recommend you to do start collecting the same, if you have not already done so.
Take it easy
When it comes to the effort you expend in the kitchen, the best advice I can give is not to be martyr - there is nothing more discomforting for guests than eating food, the making of which has frazzled the host to the point where she can hardly enjoy herself. In fact I would directly suggest being honest with your guests. Two well-prepared courses will always be loved and enjoyed more than three which do not work, and which have exhausted you.
With the notion of healthy eating now so prevalent in our lives, and with the dangers of supersized portions now pretty clear to us all (watch the astonishing Supersize Me, and the even more startling Supersize Me 2 Holy Chicken). we have found that many of our guests are now out of the habit of even eating three courses, let alone four or five, and so we often serve only two good courses, with coffees, liqueurs and possibly some chocolates afterwards, which guests can choose to eat or leave. It is more than enough. Everyone goes home happy and replete and we often find people expressing their thanks for the consideration we have shown.
The 12-hour banquet
Admittedly this flies in the face of the numerous 12-hour banquets we did with our neighbours in Kent, but in fact even these did not involve eating any more than a four course meal spread over 12 hours, thus taking up two meals and so not actually representing over-eating at all. The difference was that each course was eaten at leisure, and accompanied with games and social conversation, which means you eat less. The human satiety trigger only kicks in after 20mins, so eating more quickly than that usually results in eating more than we need to.
Commencing at about 2pm with starters and aperitifs or a cocktail du jour, the banquet saw us launching into games soon after, and then collapsing breathlessly into our garden chairs, ready for the main course at around 4pm. This would be consumed over an hour or more, with alcoholic accompaniments, and pots of tea and fruit after that. Platters of various cheeses would arrive at around 7pm, followed by dessert at 9pm or 10pm, with coffeee and liqueurs up to midnight, and hot chocolate just before guests left at around 2am.
Themes to focus the mind
With the theme of the banquet agreed in advance - the last one was Spanish - everyone would bring (agreed) contributions so there was plenty of food, and each course was served when people said they were ready for it.
The Italian banquet was all about making your own pizza and we set up an ingredients 'bar for it, muhc like a perfumer's organ, and which was terrific fun. At one point we had a competition to see who could make the most innnovative pizza. Each person had to put a pizza forward, and after cooking them, they were all duly laid out for everyone to try. Then we voted. The winner was an unusual combination of crispy courgette, cream cheese, pineapple, lemon and honey. With not a tomato or sausage in sight, and superlight to eat, it was the very essence of Summer and, I felt, could easily have been served as a dessert.
Goulasch is oh-so forgiving
Getting back to the Goulasch, this is a forgiving dish in other respects too: you can make it with beef or pork, which may spare your budget, and you can make the dumplings with flour, water and butter, so do not need to use suet at all, if you prefer or cannot find it in your local store. The non-negotiables are tomato paste, paprika, marjoram, caraway seeds, bay leaves, balsamic vinegar and brown sugar. So here it is:
Prep time: 30 mins Cook time: 1.5-2 hrs
Ingredients - for the dumplings
250gr self-raising flour
140gr shredded suet or butter 1.5tbs baking powder a dash of water
salt, pepper and oregano to flavour
Ingredients - for the goulasch 2lb of diced stewing pork or beef
butter
6 chopped onions
2 medium chopped carrots 2 sticks chopped celery
4 tomatoes
tomato paste
red wine
sweetg paprika, smoky paprika, hot paprika, 2tbs marjoram, 2tbs caraway seeds, 2 bayleaves
50ml balsamic vinegar
4 tbsp brown sugar
water or stock (optional)
Method
1-Start by making the dumplings: blend 250gr self-raising flour, 140gr shredded suet or butter, 1.5 tsp baking powder, some water, salt, pepper and oregano to a soft dough. Shape it into golf ball-sized dumplings, put them on a plate, cover with clingfilm and refrigerate them.
2-Braise 2lb of diced stewing pork or beef in batches in butter, then remove it and set it aside.
3-For the ragout braise 6 chopped onions, carrots and celery in butter until golden. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, red wine, sweet paprika, smoky paprika, hot paprika, 2 tbsp each of marjoram and caraway seeds, 4 tbsp of brown sugar, 2 bay leaves, and then stir. If the dish needs salt, add it now. At this point the dish will not have a rounded flavour, and you will be able to discern all seasonings individually, but bear with it....
4-Return the braised meat to the pan, stir it and pour the resulting stew into your baking dish or pot. Alarmingly, before you put this into your oven, the sauce will taste like burning car tyres (I'm not joking!), due to the uncooked smoked paprika, but the second half of the baking will transform this, so bear with it, dear readers. It will not disappoint.
5-Bake in a pre-heated oven at 200C, covered, for 45mins. Then take the dumplings out of the oven, carefully push them into the sauce and bake for 20mins uncovered. Gently turn the dumplings over, using two spoons, then bake again for 20mins, again uncovered. This is the fastest cook time - you can cook this low and slow for several hours, if you wish to, but serve it while the meat is still tender.
Serve this with a glass of red wine and a green salad – or in bowls with crusty bread.
Notes
1-When buying the meat for this, invest in fatty cuts which come in large chunks so that the fat melts and tenderises the meat and it falls off the fork in the tender mouthfulls. Removing the fat and cutting the meat into small portions will ensure that it cooks into hard, dry bullets....
2-Use good wine for this recipe, but if you are cooking for someone who cannot drink alcohol, replace this with more tomato paste, broth or stock, and just a little apple juice.
3-You can use very dark sugar with this - it adds gorgeous colour - so I recommend you to experiment to see which kind you prefer.
4-You can make this very spicy, by adding more hot paprika, but be very careful with this: paprika is renowned for taking its time to unfold its flavours and heat. Therefore, add it a little at a time, and stir it. Then allow at least 5 minutes in between each addition to check on the flavour and heat. Avoid rushing this or you will spoil your valuable work.
5-Before placing the dumplings in the sauce, I always make a point of tasting this dish for balance. The flavur notes should be deep, warm, mellow, rich and herbal. There should be some softness from the brown sugar, a little bit of acidity from the wine and balsamic, but the whole should be nicely balanced. This dish is to stew what port is to wine.
6-You can annoint each portion of this with a decorative twirl of sour cream, and some parsely or chives. Some Hungarians also add parsley while making the ragout itself.
7-This dish freezes very well.
***bon appetit***
Credits: all photographs used are either mine or they have been sourced from Unsplash, a source of excellent, high quality pictures, which are free to use.
Comments