Hungarian Bogracs: Campfire Goulash Soup with Ribs
Bogracs isn't made at home on the stove. The name itself tells you what it is and how it's cooked: it comes from the Hungarian bogrács, meaning a cauldron.
The history of the dish goes back to the days when the Hungarians still lived in the Urals and were “sorting things out” with the Turks. They say the most important ingredient, paprika, got into bogracs by accident. The Turks overdid it a bit when cooking meat with roots and spices. The cook tossed paprika into the cauldron, and the whole Turkish army was afraid of setting the steppe on fire with their breath and refused to eat. The food was given to Ugric captives, who realized that if they added lots of paprika to their food, the Turks wouldn't take it away and they'd get nothing.
Obviously, no potatoes were added in the 15th-16th centuries. The recipe has hardly changed, and although people make it in very different ways, the base is the same. Even beef goulash is very similar to bogracs, though it's made a little differently.
But, as everyone knows, Ukrainian borscht has as many versions as there are cooks who make it.
I'll tell you how Ihor Bondarenko (Bond) taught me to make bogracs during a friendly fishing trip that Kyiv anglers made to Lviv. Since then, I and others have made it many, many times.
Ingredients
6 l cauldron
- Smoked salo (cured pork fat) 250 g
- Onions 3-4
- Carrots 1-2
- Potatoes 1.5 kg
- Sweet paprika 2 tbsp
- Meat: pork and veal (ribs) 1.5 kg
Step-by-step recipe
- Bogracs means a campfire, a cauldron and the great outdoors.
- Put 250 grams of finely diced smoked salo into the cauldron. Render it until golden. Meanwhile, peel 3-4 large onions.
- Then chop them finely and fry them in the rendered fat.
- When the onion turns golden, the big moment arrives: stirring constantly, toss about 2 heaping tablespoons of sweet ground red pepper (paprika) into the sizzling onion. Bogracs should be bright red.
- Do it all quickly and carefully: the paprika must not burn. This is the key moment of the cooking: the paprika has to soak in the hot fat, otherwise it will just sink to the bottom and the dish won't get its proper aroma and color.
- At this point, add the carrots sliced into rounds (1-2 of them).
- Bogracs means lots of meat. As soon as you've stirred in the paprika, add the meat. For this amount you'll need about one and a half kilograms of pork and veal, with at least half of it on the ribs; it can all be ribs. Cut the meat into fairly small pieces (about 2×2 or 3×3 cm).
- Stir, add enough water to cover the meat and throw in the seasoning: I mostly use Hungarian Vegeta, or Polish Kucharek; these vegetable seasonings go in instead of salt. For the meat, about one heaping tablespoon. Cover the cauldron and simmer the meat for quite a long time, stirring from time to time.
- When the meat is done, add finely chopped potatoes, top up with water to the right amount for the portion, add more of the same seasoning to taste (the potatoes will absorb salt) and cook until the potatoes are tender.
- You can throw in a sprig of dill and parsley along with the potatoes.
- One more thing… there's a tradition: when the onion and paprika base is ready, everyone who had a hand in cooking gets a 50-gram shot and a piece of bread. They drink to a tasty meal, dip the bread in the base and eat it as a chaser.
| Serves: | 6 l cauldron |
| Calories: | 116 |
| Prep: | 30 mins |
| Cook: | 2 h |
| Total: | 2 h 30 mins |
| Category: | Soups |
| Cuisine: | European |
| Rating: |
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4.8
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