Beef Goulash

My family comes from the Czech Republic so I love the classic Eastern European dishes. My mom recently came back from visiting Prague and brought some Czech cookbooks back with her. There are lots of cool dishes I wanted to try but the goulash was in every single book so I had to try it first. The funniest part of the cookbooks is that fact that all the measurements are in metric units so I had to convert everything to our system haha.

You can serve this up with a rice or potato side dish and if you want to be really traditional, bread dumplings. I love how this dish uses really Czech flavors like caraway seeds and paprika.

Ingredients:

2-3 Tbs Olive Oil
2 lbs stew beef
1 large onion, sliced
2 Tbs paprika
salt and pepper
1/2 tsp caraway seeds
3 clove garlic
beef stock or water to cover
zest and juice of 1/2 lemon
1 tsp marjoram
1 Tbs butter
1 Tbs flour

Directions:

1. Pour olive oil in a large pan and heat over medium high. Season beef chunks with salt and pepper. Sear beef in oil until browned.

2. Add sliced onion and saute about 5 minutes or until onion is translucent. Add garlic and cook for 1 minute.

3. Add paprika and caraway and toast for 30 seconds. Cover beef with stock. Make sure to scrap the bottom of the pan to get up all the browned bits of flavor.

4. Simmer this mixture over low heat until meat is soft, about 1- 2 hours.

5. While beef is cooking make mashed potatoes or dumplings.

6. Once meat is soft, add a mixture of 1 tbs butter to 1 tbs flour that has been mashed to a paste to a small separate bowl. Whisk a ladle worth of the goulash liquid into the flour-butter mash (roux) and stir until smooth mixture. Add 1 more ladle worth and whisk in separate bowl. Once side mixture is smooth and well incorporated, add back the the goulash pan and mix well. Allow to cook over a simmer until sauce is thickened to your liking. Once thickened, add a squeeze of lemon and the marjoram to add some brightness to the heavy dish.

7. Cut dumplings or spoon out some potatoes and then top with the goulash and lots of extra sauce!