I have paprika on the mind. We’ve just come back from a short trip to Vienna and I picked up a bag of a lovely paprika in the hopes of making a gulasch at home soon. Coincidentally, I had already had a go at making chicken paprikash prior to my trip, not knowing that I was going to a land full of this magnificent spice.

Chicken Paprikash

I’ll have my Vienna posts up soon (I love going through the photos) but first, the chicken paprikash recipe. It’s spicy and creamy and rich and everything I was looking for that day. I chose to use chicken thigh fillets, thus cutting down on the cooking time and making it very suitable for a weeknight dinner. We had ours on rice but buttered noodles would be good too (and more traditional) and even bread would be excellent to sop up the sauce. Try to use a Hungarian paprika if you can find it – it’s flavour is totally worth it.

Chicken Paprikash
serves 3.

6 skinless, boneless chicken thigh fillets
flour
salt and freshly ground black pepper
sunflower oil
1 tbsp butter
1 onion, chopped
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
1.5 tbsps Hungarian paprika, sweet or sweet-hot
2 tomatoes, chopped
350 ml chicken stock
50-100 ml sour cream

Heat about 200ml sunflower oil in a large saute pan over medium heat. Mix flour, salt and black pepper in a shallow bowl and dust the thigh fillets in this mixture. When the oil is hot, fry the thigh fillets on both sides until browned. When browned (but not necessarily cooked through), drain and set aside.

Drain all but about 1 tbsp of oil in the saute pan and melt the butter in too. Add the chopped onion and fry until softened. Throw in the garlic and continue sauteing until the raw smell of the garlic becomes the mellow sweetness of cooked. Add the paprika and chopped tomatoes and continue frying for another few minute. Pour in the chicken stock and stir thoroughly to combine. Place the chicken thighs back into the saute pan and bring the liquid to a boil. Reduce the heat, cover the pan, and let simmer for about 10 minutes, turning once halfway through. Stir through the sour cream (start with a bit and add more if you’re happy – I ended up using all 100ml as I felt like it!) and bring back to a simmer. Season to taste and serve on top of rice or buttered noodles or with bread.

At the end of June, I was asked if I’d like to take part in the shooting of an internet promo ad for the new Lenovo IdeaPad K1 Tablet. It sounded like fun – two days of filming and eating and just being myself really; it certainly did turn out to be fun and it was the production team who invited me to lunch at The Sportsman. A few days ago, the result was put up on YouTube. The video was made by the production team at HMX Media and filmed by Matt Uhry and it was terrific working with them all. A few of my photos from those two days can be found in this Flickr photoset.

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