When I was a kid, we had a skipping song that included the lines, “Goulash, paprikash, one, two, three! Noodle, strudel, touch your knees! Rigatoni, macaroni…”
I can’t recall the rest, but I know that I hadn’t the foggiest idea what paprikash was back then – and until today had never made it.
Turns out chicken paprikash is a tasty Hungarian chicken stew in a tomato sauce enriched with sour cream, and very simple to make. Taking the girls into consideration, I opted for sweet paprika, then upped the spiciness for the adults.
Chicken paprikash
(serves 4 generously)
- 8 chicken thighs, bone-in and skin on
- salt and pepper
- 1 Tb sunflower oil
- 3 Tb butter
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 3 Tb flour
- 3 Tb paprika, sweet or spicy
- 1 400g tin chopped tomatoes
- 1 cup chicken stock
- 500g egg noodles
- 3/4 cup sour cream
- Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C). Heat a large, oven-proof pot over medium heat. Melt the oil and a tablespoon of butter together.
- Season the chicken thighs with salt and pepper, and sear on all sides. Remove from the pan and set aside.
- Drain all but a tablespoon of oil from the pot, and adjust the heat to medium. Add the onion, and sauté until softened. Add the garlic and cook for a few minutes more.
- Sprinkle over the flour and paprika, and cook for a couple of minutes, then add the chopped tomatoes and stock. Bring to a simmer and return the chicken to the pot.
- Cover and bake for thirty minutes until the sauce is thickened and the chicken cooked through.
- When the chicken is almost ready, boil a large pot of salted water and cook the egg noodles. Drain and toss with the remaining two tablespoons of butter.
- Remove the chicken from the sauce and whisk in the sour cream. Season to taste.
- Arrange the chicken on a bed of noodles, the ladle over the sauce.
Ten More Bites 
Not only I love Paprikash, I also like the idea of embedding the thoughts of the good food into children’s mind from very early age with the skipping song.. :))
I wish I could remember the whole thing. I think it was “rigatoni, macaroni, turn around, something , something, touch the ground.” We used to do it with a long skipping rope you doubled so there were two ropes turning at once, called double Dutch. I wondered if I started skipping, would the words just come back?
Ahaha 🙂