Kosher Dairy Szegedi Goulash for the Week Before Tisha B’Av

Unless you are ready for another load of sushi, slice of pizza or peanut butter sandwich, keep reading!

Szegedi Goulash is originally a Hungarian dish prepared from pork meat. But not this one!  In fact, this recipe has no meat in it at all.  I used to work in a hotel with a restaurant where I met an amazing chef, whose name was Vladimir Braun who was awarded many culinary degrees. Although I was in charge with the reception desk, I did not want to miss the opportunity to learn from him how to cook. Often he allowed me to come into the kitchen and watch him cook.  He taught me about many tricks that chefs are familiar with. One of the recipes I learned from him was how to make good goulash. Szegedi Goulash, besides the usual ingredients, contains pickled cabbage, heavy cream and sour cream.  I have been keeping kosher since 2009 and because we are now going through the last days of mourning culminating in the tragic day of Tisha B’Av,  and therefore religious Jews don’t eat meat this week, I am presenting this main course as a milchig or dairy meal. I bet you’ll have a hard time believing that it’s actually not a mixture of meat and dairy together!

2 packages dehydrated soy meat  (cubes)

1 big jar (650 g) pickled cabbage or equivalent amount of fresh cabbage

2 big onions

3 cloves garlic

1 cup sour cream

1 cup heavy cream

5 tbs sunflower oil

2 tbs butter

2 tbs flour

3 tbs parve chicken soup mix

3 tbs sweet paprika

1 tbs spicy paprika

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp black pepper

1 tbs salt

Cook dehydrated soy meat in water with one tbs parve chicken soup mix and stir. Heat sunflower oil and brown chopped onion till it is almost burnt. Chef Braun explained to me that the color of goulash depends more on onion than paprika. Add garlic, sweet and spicy paprika, cumin, soup mix and pepper. Stir pickled cabbage and wash it with water so it is not so sour although bit of sour taste is very nice in this goulash. Add soy meat and cabbage. Add enough water so all ingredients are covered. Melt butter in a small pan, add flour and brown it. Add about one scoop of water from the goulash to the pan with butter and flour, mix it and add it back to the goulash. Mix well and the goulash will get thicker. Let it simmer for about 5 min, add heavy and sour cream and mix well. Add salt if necessary. Serve with rye bread. Beer goes very well with it as well.

 

Pearl Devreux is from Czechoslovakia, and has lived in Europe, Miami, Florida, and currently resides in Israel. She jet-sets around a lot and eating only kosher food, she has thus developed and reformed a lot of her own European family specialties into recipes that are so easy, you can even make some of them in a hotel room. Nothing can stop Pearl in creating practical and yummy food that all of us can appreciate. From her “Birthday Cake You Can Make Even with a Baby on Your Lap” and her ‘making Challah even in a Hotel Room’, Pearl is the down to earth, ‘girl next door’, that we can all relate to.

 

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