Hey, I’m heading to hunting camp this weekend, and am looking for a good crock pot recipe of some kind. I like to prepare something at home, so when I get to camp (actually, camp is a farm house in the country), I can plug in the crock pot when I leave in the morning. When we get back to camp after a day of hunting followed by drinking, dinner is ready with minimal activity.
In the years past, I have made both green and red chili, pollo con arroz, and Slovakian goulash. I thought I would poll the master chefs at the forum here, to see if anyone has developed a killer crock pot recipe.
To start it off, here’s the Slovakian goulash recipe:
4 lbs. Pork shoulder (Boston butt), cubed
1 tbs ground black pepper
2 large onions
1/3 cup of oil
1 tbs cumin
2 tbs sweet Hungarian paprika
2 tbs hot Hungarian paprika
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 lbs sauerkraut
1 cup cream (sweet)
1 can beef broth
1 can vegetable broth
1 teaspoon of salt
Put the oil (or pork fat) into a pot and then fry the diced onions. Then add the pork (which should be cut up into cubes) to the frying onions. After 15 minutes or so, once the juices are escaping from the meat, then tansfer to the crock poyt.
Add the salt, cumin, pepper, paprika and pour in the broth. Set the crock on low.
When you get back to camp, add the saurkraut and cook for an hour. Meanwhile, boil up a pot of egg noodles.
Add the cream to the pork n kraut and let it cook for a further five minutes.
Finally add the soy sauce and cook for the remaining five minutes.
Countdown to Cappozoli’s head exploding, in three, two, one…
;D Sorry if that catches you confused, bit of an old forum joke about crockpots (and one user’s intense phobia of them).
The last paprika I bought was serbian. Much cheaper than hungarian…I can’t tell much difference, but then I’m not comparing them side by side in similar recipes, or eating it straight. I should probably test that!
After a long day in the cold hunting or especially snowmobiling(when you’re whipped), there’s not much better than having a couple brews and diving into a nice hot, low fuss, filling meal from the crockpot! Can’t tell ya how good it smells in the cabin or motel room when you get back from a long day on our beautiful U.P. trails! 8)
Chumley that Slovakian gulash is called Segedin gulash. (say ga deen)
Soy sauce is a common ingredient in Slovakian cooking
I have had this dish many times in Slovakia. I notice some inconsistencies with your recipe though (not that they are wrong just perhaps not authentic)
One is, never heard of cumin seed in there but they put in loads of caraway seeds, I would also add some marjoram, bay leaf and celery seed. Or diced celery root.
They also use sour cream not regular cream.
Then some butter flour roux so it gets a little thick.
I would have bought hungarian, since I was making paprikash and gulyas, but I have a cheap streak a mile wide and they had the ljuta and…and…“sweet” (I forget!) varieties for very cheap by comparison.
All paprika is is dried peppers ground up…the type of pepper (as well as any additional factors, such as smoking to dry, or roasting, etc) is going to make a huge difference. I wonder what sort of differences an Indian pepper powder vs a Eastern European pepper powder might portend.
Peppers are fantastic…easily my favorite vegetable…chilis, capsicums/bell, love them all. Roasted four of them and cooked them down with spices to stretch my jar of ajvar a bit further!
Oops, I’m getting carried away with a threadjack. Crockpots are handy tools. I use mine every now and again but I think I love the process of cooking too much to really get much benefit out of them. Do you think on high they would get hot enough to use as a chinese “hot pot” kind of thing (ie., really hot broth, cooking thinly sliced meat and veg on skewers at the table)? That would be a nice way to get more use out of the thing without buying a new space-consuming device just for the task.
I could probably pull off a fondue on mine if I kept the liquid level low(less than half). Have to make a full pot of anything, except oatmeal - that gets two hours at about half full and it’s awesome.
Cap I forget, are you Slovakian-in-law or Slovenian-in-law? My Balkan IQ is improving but I’m still a bit fogged on all the variations still. I will say that I’m enjoying Serbian food. There’s something about the food of countries we’ve formerly been at odds with…German, Italian, Japanese, Korean…I suppose I should add Iraqi cuisine to the list of “to learns”.
My other half is Slovakian and yes everything is ova or ovy. Its weird there that every female has ova on the end of there name. My wifes maiden name is Antolova. Her father and brothers last name is Antol.
Now her last name is Capozzoliova. ;D I think it comes from the Latin Ovum for ovaries or something?
I wouldn’t even use a crock pot for a toilet. Only Kidding, I use it at parties to keep my balls warm.
Nic soon after we evacuate Iraq they will all come here and open restaurants just like the Vietnamese. I cant wait!
Interesting. Do you speak Serbian? Do they have the feminine and masculine for things that make no sense at all like a table is female but a bottle is masculine? Man I hate that. I have been learning Slovakian. Its really hard. My daughter speaks mostly Slovakian cause that is what she is learning first, little English so far.
I cant speak Slovakian that well yet but They cant speak it anymore without me knowing what they are saying. 8)
Nic, I did a lot of research and comparing of paprika. It was brought to the Hungarians from the Turks and Im pretty sure it founds its way to Turkey from India via the silk road. Welcome
Compared side by side the Pride of Seged or whatever it is called against the Indian stuff you can tell they are the same but the Indian stuff has much better color aroma and flavor.
There are many different kinds of Paprika in Hungary. Fresh, Dry, powdered, Sweet, hot, and many others. There is a giant market in Budapest that is great. The paprika stalls have all different kinds of dried peppers hanging everywhere. Really cool and the smell is wonderful. They are all the same peppers every other country uses to make paprika by air drying and grinding to a fine powder.
In the Indian store look for the sweet paprika or ask. They have several varieties most are VERY hot.
The can paprika we get in this country is of a very low quality and but a mere shadow of the stuff in Hungary. On the other hand the Indian stuff compares.
When you go to the Indian store look for a tiered pressure cooker. I haven’t gotten one yet but I want one. They have layered containers inside that allow you to cook more than one coarse in the same pot.
