Pörkölt: Hungarian beef stew

I enjoy this warming stew and have always liked the flavor of paprika, sweet or spicy, Hungarian or smoked as they do in Spain. The recipe below is based on Eating European and Daring Gourmet. 

Pörkölt topped with sour cream, over spätzle

Today in Barcelona, I'm substituting some local ingredients -- Spanish pimenton dulce for Hungarian sweet paprika, red bell for green, Spanish onions for sweet ones, schmaltz for lard; I'm picturing lots of grandmothers spinning in their graves, but it makes for a fine dinner.

Takes about 2.5 hours, most of which is simmering almost unattended.
Serves 2 graciously.

             Lard, bacon fat, schmaltz, butter, olive oil, ...

   1 medium  Onion, finely chopped

 1/2 medium  Green Pepper (or red), seeded, finely chopped

   1 clove   Garlic, minced

 340 g       Beef for stew (chuck, "aguja", "cap de mort"), 1cm chunks

  10 g       Paprika, Hungarian, (or Spanish), sweet [2 Tbs]

   1 medium  Tomato, finely diced

  to taste   Salt [1 tsp]

  to taste   Black Pepper, ground

   1 g       Caraway Seeds, coarsely crushed [1/4 tsp]

   1         Bay Leaf

~200 ml      Water (or Beef Stock)

In a large heavy pot or skillet, melt the Lard or other Fat, then sauté the Onions until softened and golden.

Add Bell Pepper and Garlic, and cook 2-3 more minutes.
Move the veggies to the edge, or remove temporarily, and add Beef and sauté to brown, and cook until some of the pink is gone.
Stir in Paprika and and Tomato, then remove from heat so it doesn't turn bitter.

Add the Salt, Pepper, Caraway Seeds, and Bay.
Add just enough Water (or Stock) to come up halfway, to barely cover the Beef.
Return to heat, bring to boil, reduce heat, then cover and simmer 90 minutes.
(While it's cooking, you can make the Spätzle.)

The stew should be fairly thick; if not, remove the cover, increase heat, and let evaporate.
Adjust Salt and Pepper.

Serve, optionally topped with a dollop of Sour Cream.

Accompany with Spätzle, boiled potatoes, or wide egg noodles.

[I'm adding "porkolt" here since Blogger's search won't find the real name without the umlauts]

Butifarra con Garbanzos: Pork Sausage with Chickpeas

Butifarra (pork sausage) is omnipresent here in Barcelona, and we're using the basic mild form rather than negre/morcilla (blood), ous (egg), or other forms. Chickpeas are also super popular, like the many forms of beans and legumes. We've got plenty of both on hand, so wanted a dinner that combines these, not necessarily together in a stew, but as complements. 

I'm taking ideas from José Andrés "Tapas: A Taste of Spain in America": Moorish-style chickpea and spinach stew, and Butifarra amb Mongets del Ganxet "Daniel Patrick Moynihan" (so "inside the Beltway"!); and Penelope Casas "¡Delicioso! The Regional Cooking of Spain" recipe Espinacas con Garbanzos a la Sevillana. Chickpeas combine synergistically with spinach: earthy, rich, and much more tasty than it sounds; it's a classic dish here, and there are many variants, including ones with bacalao around the holidays.

Irene cooked up a mountain of dried chickpeas in the Instant Pot: it makes fast work of the beans, so I'm using her pre-cooked beans and some of the left over cooking liquid here. 

Serves 2

 35 ml     Olive Oil (2 Tbs)
  2        Butifarra (225 g total)

  3 clove  Garlic

250 g      Chickpeas, cooked
 80 ml     Chickpea cooking water

  1 slice  White Bread, 1 cm thick, crust removed
  1 Tbs    Sweet Pimentón
  1 Tbs    Spanish Sherry Vinegar
250 g      Spinach, chopped
  1 g      Cumin, ground (1/2 tsp)

  1 g      Rosemary, fresh, minced (or 0.5 g dried)
to taste   Salt
to taste   White Pepper

Sauté Garlic and Butifarra in Olive Oil; when the Garlic is lightly browned, about 3 minutes, remove and reserve; continue the Butifarra until cooked, 8-10 minutes total; reserve.

Brown the Bread on both sides, a couple minutes each; remove.
Let the pan cool then add the Pimentón, then Sherry Vinegar to prevent Pimentón from burning; remove pan from heat.
Smash the Garlic and toasted Bread in a mortar to make a thick paste.

Add the Chickpeas, Chickpea cooking liquid, and Spinach to the pan and simmer to lightly cook the Spinach, about 5 minutes.
Add the Garlic/Bread paste, it should be a thick stewy sauce.

Season to taste with Salt and Pepper

Add more Chickpea Liquid if it's getting too dry.

Reduce heat to low; place the cooked Sausage next to the stew to warm it through and let the flavors combine, 5-10 more minutes.

Plate the Sausage then ladle the Chickpeas stew next to it.

Lentejas con Chorizo (Lentils with Chorizo)

This Spanish lentil and chorizo dish is simple, warming, and hearty -- a classic. Recipes range from soupy to stewy; I lean toward a thicker consistency for dinner but don't want to overcook the lentils to the point of being mushy. For this dish, I'm taking cues from Spanish Sabores and Spain on a Fork.

I used brown lentils, but you can use black or green. In this rendition, I had a string of little chorizo balls, so I cut them into attractive hemispheres. We had some vegetable stock in the freezer which Irene simmered with some pork bones that we'd collected to give it some body. We've got rosemary, thyme, and bay growing on the terrace so we've used all three, but you can use any combination of aromatics that you like. The pickled Guindilla chilis just a little spicy, their acidity adds balance to the richness; our Catalan supermarket calls the Bixtos and they're also known as Piparras. If you can't find the Ñora or Choricero, use some Pimenton (Spanish smoked Paprika); the Ñora has a richness of tomato paste combined with the rich tobacco/leather notes of Ancho or Poblano chilis.

Total time about 1 hour; serves two:

125 g       Lentils, dried
600 ml      Stock (pork, beef, chicken, or vegetable)
    taste   Black Pepper, fresh ground
  1 stalk   Celery, whole
  1 sprig   Rosemary, whole for removal later
  1 bunch   Thyme, leave on stem for removal later
  1 whole   Bay Leaf
150 g       Chorizo, sliced into rounds
 15 ml      Olive Oil (a generous glug to prevent fat from burning)
  1 large   Onion, diced
  2 large   Carrots, large slice or dice
1/2         Red Bell Pepper, medium, large dice (72 g here)
  4 clove   Garlic, sliced thin
  1 medium  Tomato, crushed
 20 g       Ñora Pepper paste
2-4         Guindilla Chilis packed in vinegar

I'd suggest doing a mise en place -- measuring your ingredients and chopping your vegetables ahead of time -- so you don't risk overcooking the Lentils.

Rinse the Lentils and check for debris.

Add the Lentils to a pot with the Black Pepper, Celery, and whole aromatic herbs, and cover with Stock, then bring to a low simmer. These take the longest time to cook so give them a head start while you prepare the sofrito.

In a skillet, sear the Chorizo on all sides to render a little fat; continuing to sauté so the sausage cooks through.

In the skillet with the Chorizo fat, add the Oil and sauté the Onions and Carrots until the onions start to brown, then add Garlic and Pepper for a couple minutes, then the Tomatoes. Cover and cook over medium heat until reduced to a paste -- a sofrito -- about 10 minutes.

Add the sofrito and Ñora paste to the Lentil pot and simmer on low until the flavors have combined. Don't let it cook so much that the Lentils get mushy; if there's too much liquid, boost the heat but stir constantly so the lentils at the bottom don't burn. If it starts drying out, add more Stock or water and lower the heat. Taste and adjust Salt. Remove Celery and aromatic herbs.

Serve with the seared Chorizo, and top with some pickled Guindilla Chili peppers; slicing them makes it easier to eat without a knife. A hearty red wine works well with this rich dish.

Lazy Bouillabaisse

This is a quick, weekday night take on the Mediterranean tomato-based fish stews. I started with Kate Rentschler’s Bouillabaisse from Cook’s Illustrated September 2001, then streamlined per Roberta Donna’s Zuppa di Pesce, memories of San Francisco Cioppino, and now improvise using the flavor profiles I’m looking for -- and tasting all the time. The texture’s thinner than a stew but thicker than a soup. The flavors I really enjoy here are saffron, orange, and anise.

We can tomatoes from the farmers market at the end of the season, but store-bought canned tomatoes are fine, too. You want the skins removed. All proportions are approximate, and use fish that’s fresh. You want some firm fish and some flakey fish for interesting texture; some shellfish is fine too.

Serves 2 as a main course, 4 as a starter

¼ tsp Saffron threads

3 Tbs Pernod, Absinthe or other anise liquor

¼ Cup Olive Oil

1 clove Garlic, minced

1 quart Tomatoes, skinned (we can our own, canned chopped are fine)

to taste Chili pepper flakes

to taste Salt

1 tsp Orange Zest (from about ½ an orange)

¼ pound Firm fish, cut into spoon-friendly chunks

¼ pound Flakey fish, cut into chunks

Crumble the Saffron threads into a cup with the Pernod and let flavors dissolve.

In skillet, cook Garlic until soft.

Add Tomatoes and their juice, and crush with a potato masher until chunky but small enough to eat gracefully from a spoon.

Bring it to a good boil, you want to emulsify the oil and tomato mixture to give it body.

Add Chili flakes and Salt.

Taste for body and add more oil if it feels thin and without luxury.

Turn down heat and add Orange Zest, Saffron and Pernod.

Cook gently to marry flavors and taste, adjusting seasonings and oil.

Add the fish, starting with the firmest, and simmer until just barely cooked.

Adjust seasonings once more.

Serve in pre-warmed bowls.

Extra credit if you top with a crouton and rouille.

Feijoada

Serves a lot of hungry people, you might want to cut this in half. Here, shown served with rice, collard greens, oranges and some vinegar-y hot sauce to balance the richness.

This is a rich meat and bean stew, the national dish of Brazil; you could compare it to French Cassoulet. We got this from our friends who were stationed in Rio in the 1970’s, they got it from their cook. It compares quite favorably to the ones I’ve had at Brazilian restaurants and churrascarias.  

We haven’t used the pig ears our original recipe calls for, and over the years we’ve been dialing down the meat a bit too. I’m guessing the meat-heavy proportions of the original were aimed at more affluent folks; it’s still plenty rich. I cook some of the beans long to dissolve into the sauce for body, and some less so they stay whole and provide texture. I expect there are as many styles of Feijoada as there are Chili con Carne in the States.

1 pound Black Beans, dried (or 4 pounds canned)

½ pound Fat Back (salty), cut into 6 pieces

2 large Onions, chopped coarse

5 cloves Garlic, sliced

3 Bay Leaves

½ pound Kielbasa, sliced into half-moons

1 pound Chuck Roast, boneless, cut into 8 pieces

1 pound Short Ribs (2-4 rib sections, on bone)

6 Cup Pork Stock (or Beef, or Water if you have to)

Soak dried Beans overnight, just covered in water.

Heat Fatback to render some fat.

Add Onions, Garlic, bay and saute until translucent; reserve to plate.

Season Chuck and Ribs with Salt and Pepper;

brown on all sides in rendered fat, don’t crowd the pan, use batches if needed,

then reserve to plate.

Drain off excess fat, reserving if you need it for body later.

Add half the rehydrated beans, the Stock, Onions, Garlic, and Bay and cook an hour or so until the beans are done -- time depends on how fresh the beans are.

Reserve half the beans.

Mash the beans in the liquid to thicken the sauce you’re developing.

Add back all the Meats; the stock should cover everything, if not, add more.

Simmer another hour or two until the meat is almost done;

I like the meat falling apart tender but not disintegrating.

Add the reserved cooked beans, adjust seasonings (including reserved fat if it seems a little lacking in rich body), and bring back to simmer.

Serve with rice, collard greens, slices of orange and a tangy sauce like Texas Petes or Franks. The citrus and vinegar cut the richness of the feijoada. Top with Farofa if you can find it (there’s even a bacon-flavored farofa :-).