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Hungarian Beef Stew

A hearty beef stew with vinegar, butter, flour, herbs, paprika, and sour cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Hungarian Beef Stew

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Choose meat from the shoulder clod or round, wipe, and cut into 1-inch blocks.

  2. Sprinkle the meat with vinegar and let it stand in a cool place for at least 1 hour.

Braise the stew

  1. Heat the butter or dripping in an enamel-ware saucepan.

  2. Add the meat and stir occasionally until it is medium brown.

  3. Add the onion and mixed herbs, then pour in 1 ⅓ cups boiling water.

  4. Simmer until the meat is tender, about 1 hour, then add salt.

  5. Mix the flour smooth in 2 tablespoons cold water and stir it into the stew.

  6. Continue stirring until boiling, then pour in the cream and add paprika to taste.

Serve

  1. Serve on a heated platter.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Lean beef
Provides the meat that becomes tender during slow simmering.
Vinegar
Its acidity begins to loosen the meat's tough fibres before cooking.
Flour
Thickens the stew liquid into a smooth, lightly body-rich sauce.
Sour cream
Adds richness and a tangy note, and softens the sauce when stirred in at the end.
Butter or dripping
Carries the heat for browning the meat and adds savoury richness.

The step that matters

Adding the cream. Sour cream can curdle or separate if it boils. Stir the stew off the boil or over low heat when adding it, so the sauce stays smooth and creamy.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Onionthe original
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Chivefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, vinegar, butter, flour, 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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