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Hungarian Chicken or Paprika Hulm

A Hungarian chicken stew flavored with paprika and finished with sour cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Hungarian Chicken or Paprika Hulm

Ingredients

Directions

Brown the base

  1. Melt the butter in a stew pan.

  2. Add the sliced onions and cook until light brown.

  3. Stir in the paprika and let the onions brown for a few more minutes.

  4. Add the chicken pieces and sprinkle with salt; brown the chicken.

  5. Once browned, add the stock or boiling water.

Stew and finish

  1. Cover the pan and stew gently until the chicken is cooked.

  2. Remove the chicken and place it on a hot dish.

  3. Add the sour cream to the gravy and heat gently without boiling.

  4. Strain the gravy over the chicken before serving.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Onion + chickentop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Butter + chickentop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Onion + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,827 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

Onion and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,827 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main protein; browning and gentle stewing cook it through while keeping it tender.
Onions
Break down while browning, adding sweetness and body to the gravy.
Sour cream
Adds richness and a tangy creaminess to the finished gravy.
Paprika
Contributes the characteristic smoky, sweet red pepper flavour and colour.
Butter
Carries the browning of the onions and chicken and adds richness.

The step that matters

Heating the sour cream without boiling. Sour cream can curdle or separate when it gets too hot, so the gravy should be heated gently and kept just below a simmer once it is added.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, chicken, cream):

  1. Potatofits about as well
  2. Onionthe original
  3. Leekfits less well
  4. Asparagusfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, chicken, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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