Back To My Roots: Hungarian Chicken Paprikash With Nokedli

I went back to my Hungarian family roots and decided to make a Hungarian dinner tonight. The great thing is that I have no problem in getting hold of the ingredients for this dish in Germany. The Nokedli is very similar to the German spaetzle and goes well with the paprika. We always had chicken paprikash for dinner when I was little and my sister was always the one asking for it. It was her favourite. Clearly she was the more cultured of the sisters ; ) We used to spend our summer holidays in Hungary and chicken paprikash would of course be eaten on more than one occasion. I have since taken my boyfriend to Budapest a couple of times and he also loves this dish. The great thing is that it is cheap and easy to make. I have my Mum to thank for this recipe.

Ingredients:

Chicken Paprikash

Chicken (Traditionally you used chicken on the bone as it is cheaper and easier to stew with)

2 tbpsn butter

1 tbpsn flour

2 onions (roughly chopped)

2 tbpsn paprika

2 cloves garlic (crushed)

200ml chicken stock

fresh parsley

200ml sour cream

• Heat oil and butter in a large/ deep pan and brown the chicken on all sides for around 5 mins
• Add the onions, garlic and 1 tspn salt. Leave for a few mins
• Then add the paprika and the flour and stir until everything is mixed well
• Add the stock and stir. Bring to the boil and leave for 10 mins
• Add the parsely, reduce the heat and leave to simmer for 50 – 60 mins
• When the chicken is cooked remove the pan from the heat, add half of the sourc cream, a bit more fresh parsley and stir it all together
• You can serve with a bit more sour cream on top

Nokedli

300g flour

3 medium free range eggs

2ooml water

1 tspn salt

• Heat pan with boiling water and leave until it starts boiling
• In the meantime take a large mixing bowl and add the flour and salt
• Then crack the eggs into the bowl and beat with the flour and mix well. A kind of thick dough will form
• Add the water and stir. The dough should be sticky
• Hold a spaetzle/ nokedli mixer (you really need one of these!) over the boiling pan and about 3 inches away pour in a bit of the dough. Slide the mixer and let it drop into the boiling water. Do this in batches
• Cook until the nokedli floats to the top (about 2 mins)
• Serve with a small amount of butter