Hungarian Feast

[sgreen0]

It's almost time for me to host a big dinner again (for 8). I'm thinking of Hungarian. It will be summer California when I do this.

Does anyone have suggestions for:

Cocktail

Appetizers (I probably need 3)

Soup (I'm thinking Cold Sour Cherry, or another cold fruit soup)

Main dish and sides

Desserts (2 - almost certainly a Dobos Torte)

Wines for any of the courses

Thanks for any suggestions you may offer.

Stephen

Edited April 13, 2010 by sgreen0 (log)

[ojisan]

1. barack palinka

2. gulyas leves

3. more barack palinka

4. toltott kaposzta

5. szalonna

6. palinka

7. and maybe a meat dish and some palinka

[sgreen0]

It sounds like you definitely have some favorites!

Would you mind translating. I do have George Lang's "The Cuisine of Hungary" to refer to, but I haven't found some of those terms in it...

Thanks.

Stephen

1. barack palinka

2. gulyas leves

3. more barack palinka

4. toltott kaposzta

5. szalonna

6. palinka

7. and maybe a meat dish and some palinka

[Lora]

A cabbage strudel would be an awesome app or side. Mmmm...Hungarian egg roll...

[sgreen0]

Lora!

I found a recipe for Kaposztas Gomboc - Cabbage dumplings.

The cabbage is sauteed, spiced and rolled jelly roll style in dough. Then it is cut into pieces and rolled into balls that are boiled, then baked with cheese on top.

That's not exactly a strudel...

Stephen

[Blether]

Nor does it sound like summer food, or something kind to offer during a California summer, either

I've been wading my way, slowly, through Patrick Leigh Fermor's Between the Woods and the Water, and just a chapter or so ago he was waxing lyrical about the Hungarian summer produce - peaches, apricots, endless fruit, but above all 'paprika' both mild and hot, in vast quantities; and energetic dancing with chants of hai! hai! hai! hai! spurred by 'the new apricot brandy'.

(He's not a gourmand, Paddy, so no detailed menu reports - landscape and townscape you can have by the shovelful. And I just found another use for Google books, for still-copyright works - you find an edition with limited searchability, look for 'apricot' and there's your page number, or close to it).

Oh, and here we are - "The summer solstice was past... Roast corn-cobs came and trout from the mountains; cherries, then strawberries, apricots and peaches, and, finally, wonderful melons and raspberries. The scarlet blaze of paprika - there were two kinds on the table, one of them fierce as gunpowder - was cooled by cucumber cut thin as muslin and by soda splashed into glasses of wine already afloat with ice; this had been fetched from an igloo-like undercroft among the trees where prudent hands had stacked it six months before, when - it was impossible to imagine it! - snow covered all".

At this point he moves into a description of the abundance of apricots, dotting the road dust, trampled underfoot and squashed by cartwheel, the heady scent of their fermentation in tall wooden vats filling the yards, and the new spirit bowling over the peasants "like a sniper, flinging the harvesters prostrate and prone in every fragment of shadow. Thay snored among sheaves and haycocks and a mantle of flies covered them while the flocks crammed together under every spread of branches, and not a leaf moved".

Undercroft. That's it, my fridge has been re-christened.

[sgreen0]

Great stuff!

I do like Cold Sour Cherry Soup. And George Lang has a Peach in Champagne soup that sounds summery...

Stephen

[Lora]

Lora!

I found a recipe for Kaposztas Gomboc - Cabbage dumplings.

That's not exactly a strudel...

Stephen

You have Lang's Cuisines of Hungary, you said? Look for Káposzta töltelék. I agree that dumplings would not be particularly summery.

[sgreen0]

Found it. Thanks.

This could be an appetizer, couldn't it?

It would be the first time I attempted a strudel dough...

Stephen

[Nayan Gowda]

Check out the "Encyclopaedia" and "Hungarian Recipes" section on Chew Hu

It was my life-saver (almost literally), when working in Hungary a couple of years ago.

No connection, etc, etc

[sgreen0]

Nayan!

Thanks for the link.

It looks wonderful!

Stephen

[sgreen0]

Well, the Hungarian Feast is history. Here is the menu (cum place card).

Most of the recipes were from George Lang's The Cuisine of Hungary. A few were gleaned from other places on the net.

My thanks to EvergreenDan in Spirits and Cocktails for his idea for the cocktail:

"I also liked equal parts Kirshwasser, Zwack Liqueur, and Campari. Next time, I may add a bit of lemon to this, in juice, peel, or bitters form. "

Now I'm looking for another country to raid for next year's feast!

Thanks to all on eGullet for you suggestions...

Stephen

[Nayan Gowda]

Stephen,

Glad the meal went well. That menu looks great!

Cheers,

Nayan