Admittedly, I don’t actually know all that much about Hungarian food, but what has filtered overseas to the US and into my mouth, mostly in the form of paprikash, goulash, stuffed pancakes, and mushroom soup, has been superlatively satisfying. There seems to be some sort of pattern here—that whatever foreign food that make it to unpretentious restaurants and little food stands here in the US invariably is awesome.

We had a surfeit of chicken thighs lately because they’ve been on sale, and I was running out of ideas on how to cook them, when I stumbled onto this recipe. (Thank you again, Elise.) It turned out so good that even Jess, who normally dislikes dark meat, approved.

Here is the recipe that I ended up using after slight tweaks:

Chicken Paprikash

Ingredients
8 pieces chicken thighs
2 tbsp butter, softened
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 small onions, thinly sliced into half rings
1 tbsp sweet Hungarian paprika
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup water

Method

1. Preheat oven to 450˚ F. Mash softened butter and garlic together. Stuff mixture under the skin of thighs and spread as evenly as possible.
2. Mix together onions, paprika, salt, and water. Spread on bottom layer of a baking pan. Place chicken thighs on top.
3. Bake for 10 minutes. Then lower heat to 350˚ F and bake for a half hour until done.
4. Serve with sauce.

(This picture is for you, Jing.)

On a whim tonight, I decided to make fishsticks. This is the kind of thing that would appall my mom if she were here. In my mom’s world, fishsticks fall squarely in the center of the American junkfood category, right next to anything with cheese in, over, or around it (my mom is very much a classic Chinese parent in this way). In an attempt to restore some dignity to this food, I made a version tonight with leftover hollandaise sauce + and panko breadrumbs, oven-fried in olive oil.

Full entry »