June 16, 2017
Friday Flavour Feature: Chicken Paprikash by Jas Brechtl
Sometime last year, one my dearest faraway friend over at All That’s Jas sent me her published Balkan Comfort Food e-book.
It was filled with all Balkan goodness where Jas has, once upon many, many months poured her soul to put together her old recipes and preserving the art of creating dishes that many generations before her have enjoyed.
That book which I did a review on has certainly not gone to waste in my hands. Several recipes have caught my eyes since and there was one recipe which I cannot get enough of: Chicken Paprikash or Pileci Paprikas.
Armed with several types of fresh paprikas as well as some authentically Hungarian paprika powder, I gave the recipe a go quite a while back. Somehow I haven’t got around to putting up the recipe. Until today that is.
Not looking quite the same as Jas has made it and with no point of reference to what she has cooked in terms of taste, I could only hope that I did some justice to her comfort food.
All I can say is that the dish left us wanting more. It was pretty damn awesome!
- 2-3 tablespoon oil
- 2 onions, chopped
- 8 pieces of mixed chicken breasts and drumsticks (with skin)
- Salt and black pepper to taste
- 1 tablespoon sweet Hungarian paprika
- 1 green bell pepper sliced
- 1 red bell pepper, sliced
- 1 yellow bell pepper, sliced (not in the original recipe)
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1 tablespoon flour
- 1 can tomato puree (the original used 1 cup tomato sauce)
- 2 cubes chicken bouillon dissolve in 2 cups of hot water (substitution of the original 1 cup chicken broth)
- 4-5 pieces fresh basil, chopped (substitution of the original 1 tablespoon dried basil)
- 1 teaspoon 1 tspn red chilli powder (substitution of the original ½ tspn red pepper flakes)
- 1 tablespoon sour cream
- Pan-fry the chicken pieces till slightly brown and set aside.
- Heat the oil in a large sauté pan over medium-high heat and add chopped onion and cook, stirring occasionally for 3-4 minutes until translucent.
- Place chicken in the pan with onions and season with salt, pepper and paprika. Let the chicken cook until done, stirring occasionally so as not to burn the onions then add peppers and garlic.
- Sprinkle the chicken and peppers with flour and stir to combine. Add tomato puree, broth,basil and red pepper flakes.
- Simmer on low heat for 10 minutes or until sauce thickens.
- Stir in sour cream.
- Serve over potatoes, dumplings, rice or pasta.
- The original recipe calls for the chicken to be first cut into strips then heat the oil in a large sauté pan over medium-high heat before placing into the pan over the onions. As I used larger pieces of chicken, I decided to pan-fry first.
I guess you add the paprika to the chicken while cooking or with the flour? I want to try this and know sometimes the paprika can take on a different note when added at different times. Thanks,
Never mind. I see where it is added to the chicken when placed with the onions. I missed that first time around.
LOL. No worries. But you know what! I think you can always play around with what comes first. It’ll probably be good too to first rub paprika all over the chicken first too! 🙂
There really isn’t a wrong way of making this dish. I usually add my seasonings right after the meat has been browned, but that’s not the rule 🙂
The Fork Queen has spoken… 😀
Now that you mentioned it, it never occurred to me that paprika can take on a different note when added at a different times! That’d be good for experiment in discovering the optimal results! Thanks for the thoughts, John! 😀
Ann, this sounds wonderful.
Have an awesome weekend.
Hugs
Indeed it is! Thanks for popping by, Sarah! A very good weekend to you too! x.
Oh, Ann, you’re doing me such an honor by cooking my recipe and I really appreciate you sharing it on your blog! Many thanks, hugs, and kisses, my friend!
Mostest welcome my dear Balkan friend! It’s such a pleasure to receive your book and I’m not about to let it collect dust with some of your awesome recipes in there! Glad you didn’t mind I shared this! 🙂 *muuuaccks*
Looks and sounds like a great recipe, Ann. Thank you for sharing it.
Most welcome Robbie! You just really have to give this one a go. 🙂