It’s the perfect weather for braising and pörkölt is a tasty option! Pörkölt is a Hungarian braised beef and onion stew with plenty of paprika. Other common ingredients include tomatoes, or tomato paste, peppers, marjoram, and caraway seeds. The dish usually starts out with lard and since I don’t commonly have it on hand I like to use with bacon, which is cooked to render out the bacon grease to cook with, and I hardly need an excuse to use bacon! The beef is browned in the bacon grease (or lard) before the onions and peppers are cooked and then everything is slowly braised until the meat is melting in your mouth tender! (This recipe is perfect for the slow cooker and super easy to make in one!) You can serve porkolt over mashed potatoes, pasta, etc.
Hungarian Braised Beef (Pörkölt)
A Hungarian style beef and onion stew with plenty of paprika!
ingredients
- 4 ounces bacon, cut into 1 inch pieces (optional)
- 2 pounds beef (such as chuck), cut into bite size pieces
- 1 large onion, diced
- 1 green pepper, diced
- 1 red pepper, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, chopped
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 2 cups beef broth
- 4 tablespoon Hungarian sweet paprika
- 1 tablespoon Hungarian hot paprika
- 1/2 teaspoon caraway seeds, ground
- 1/2 teaspoon marjoram (optional)
- 1 bay leaf (optional)
- salt and pepper to taste
directions
- Cook the bacon in a large saucepan until crispy and set aside, reserving the grease in the pan.
- Brown the beef on all sides, before setting aside.
- Add the onion, green pepper and red pepper and cook until tender, about 7-10 minutes.
- Add the garlic and tomato paste and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about a minute.
- Add the bacon, beef, broth, paprikas, caraway, marjoram, and bay leaf, bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer, covered, until the beef is falling apart tender, about 2-3 hours.
- Season with salt and pepper to taste and enjoy!
Note: The bacon is optional. Use lard (or oil) instead of bacon grease to cook the meat and vegetables in.
Option: Use pork butt/shoulder instead of beef.
Option: Add diced Hungarian wax peppers.
Option: Garnish with chopped parsley.
Option: Serve with a side of sour cream!
Option: Serve with a side of pickles!
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love beef dishes like this and new ones to me, like this one, haven’t tried it before, so thank you for this recipe!
This was a great recipe. We made it with veal and regular sweet paprika and extra hot chili powder, since Hungarian paprika (neither sweet nor hot) is not available here (we live in France), but I think we captured the Hungarian flavors and the nature of the dish pretty well.