Traditional Hungarian Beef Goulash

Aurel Pop

Servings

10

Prep Time

15 minutes

Cook Time

2.5 hours

Cuisine

Hungarian

Category

Soup

An authentic recipe for the best traditional Hungarian beef goulash soup, with original ingredients and an easy-to-follow, step-by-step guide. Made with simple ingredients like meat, peppers, and root vegetables, it's elevated to perfection with Hungary’s most famous spice: paprika. Goulash can be made with beef or pork, but traditionally it's made with beef. Originally, this was the signature dish of the herdsmen on the Hungarian Great Plain (puszta), the "Hungarian cowboys" who lived a nomadic lifestyle and cooked it over the fire in a cauldron.

Making the dish also goes hand in hand with drinking Bull's Blood wine, Hungary’s most iconic red. There is something about getting smoky while standing around a huge kettle of goulash slowly cooking over a wood fire, sharing a bottle with your best friends, that makes you feel fulfilled and happy. Stories start flowing, and playful teasing and bantering follow. That’s what goulash is about: friends, laughter, drinks and flavorful food.

Hungarian paprika is the signature flavour in most famous Hungarian dishes. It is very different from, let’s say, Spanish paprika. Hungarian paprika is naturally dried under the summer sun, whereas its Spanish counterpart is smoked over a wood fire. As a result, Hungarian paprika is known for its rich, intense red, peppery flavour and is essential to giving this dish an authentic flavour. Jó étvágyat!

Traditional Hungarian goulash recipe, this authentic beef goulash is the national dish of Hungary, best made in Budapest.

Ingredients

  • 800g beef shoulder, cut into ½ inch cubes
  • 2 cups low-sodium beef broth
  • 2-3 tomatoes, diced
  • 2 red bell peppers, de-seeded and cut into half rings
  • 2-3 large carrots, peeled and cut into rounds
  • 2-3 parsnips, peeled and cut into rounds
  • 200g celery, peeled and cut into ½ inch cubes
  • 400g potatoes, peeled and cut into ½ inch cubes
  • 1 large onion, roughly chopped
  • 5 cloves garlic, crushed and roughly chopped
  • 3-4 sprigs of fresh parsley leaves, tied together
  • 4-5 cups hot water
  • 1 tbsp pork lard
  • 1 tbsp goulash paste
  • 2 ½ tbsp. Hungarian sweet paprika
  • freshly ground black pepper
  • 1 ½ tsp ground caraway seeds
  • 2 dried bay leaves
  • ½ tbsp salt
  • ½ cup fresh parsley, finely chopped
  • 100g csipetke

Directions

  1. Heat the lard in a cast-iron Dutch oven. Add the onions and cook for 8 minutes, stirring them often so they don’t burn. If they start browning, add a tablespoon of water.

  2. Stir in caraway seeds, black pepper and bay leaves, and cook for 2 more minutes.

  3. Remove the pot from the heat, and sprinkle paprika over the onions. Stir often! (Burnt paprika is bitter.)

  4. Add beef cubes and garlic. Stir well until each piece is coated with paprika gravy. Reduce the heat to medium and cook for 2-3 minutes or until the beef cubes start browning.

  5. Mix in tomatoes, peppers, goulash paste and the remainder of the broth (1 ½ cup). The broth should cover the meat and vegetables by an inch or two. If it doesn’t, add hot water.

  6. Reduce the heat to low, cover the Dutch oven, and let it simmer for an hour and a half.

  7. Add the root vegetables (carrots, parsnips, celery and potatoes) and the tied parsley leaves to the pot. Add 4-5 cups of hot water to cover by an inch or two.

  8. Season with salt, and bring the soup to a boil over high heat. When it starts boiling, reduce the heat to medium, and cook for 15 minutes uncovered.
  9. Add the csipetke and boil for another 10-15 minutes. Taste and adjust saltiness.

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