Hungarian Holiday Plate: Chicken Paprikás with Nokedli

About This Recipe

Chicken paprikás served with nokedli is the dish most Hungarians would put forward if asked to name a single national plate — it's the centerpiece of countless Sunday lunches and family holidays. The chicken simmers in a sauce built the proper way: onions cooked until truly soft and sweet, sweet paprika bloomed off the heat, and a careful balance of stock and sour cream that thickens into something glossy rather than broken or greasy. Nokedli, small soft egg dumplings scraped straight from a board or spätzle-style press into boiling water, are the traditional starch here rather than rice or noodles, and getting their texture right — tender, slightly chewy, not doughy — is as much a marker of a good Hungarian cook as the sauce itself. The whole plate depends on sequencing: chicken thighs braise until fall-apart tender, the sauce reduces separately if needed, and sour cream goes in only at the very end, off the heat, so it stays silky instead of splitting into curds.

Ingredients

Serves 5

• 1.4 kgbone-in chicken thighs(skin removed)
• 3 tbsplard or oil
• 2 largeonions(finely chopped)
• 1green bell pepper(diced)
• 1tomato(diced)
• 3 tbspsweet Hungarian paprika
• 2 cupschicken stock
• 1 cupsour cream
• 2 tbspflour(for tempering the sour cream)
• 1.5 tspfine sea salt
• 3 largeeggs(for nokedli)
• 2.5 cupsflour(for nokedli)
• 0.75 cupwater(for nokedli)
• 1 tspsalt(for nokedli dough)

Instructions

1. 1

   Brown the chicken

   Heat lard in a large heavy pot over medium-high heat. Brown chicken thighs on both sides, about 4 minutes per side, then remove and set aside.

2. 2

   Cook the onions

   In the same pot, reduce heat to medium-low and cook onions 12-15 minutes until very soft and sweet, adding a splash of water if they start to catch.

3. 3

   Bloom the paprika

   Pull the pot off the heat, stir in the paprika, and let it bloom in the residual warmth for 20 seconds before returning to low heat.

4. 4

   Braise the chicken

   Add bell pepper, tomato, salt and stock. Return the chicken to the pot, cover, and simmer gently 35-40 minutes until the chicken is fall-apart tender.

5. 5

   Make the nokedli dough

   While the chicken braises, whisk together eggs, flour, water and salt into a thick, sticky batter. Let it rest 10 minutes.

6. 6

   Cook the nokedli

   Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Scrape small strips of dough from a cutting board (or press through a spätzle maker) directly into the boiling water. Cook 2-3 minutes until they float, then drain.

7. 7

   Finish the sauce

   Remove the chicken from the pot. Whisk the sour cream with the flour until smooth, then whisk in a ladle of the hot sauce to temper it. Stir this back into the pot off the heat until glossy.

8. 8

   Plate and serve

   Return the chicken to the sauce to warm through. Serve over the nokedli, spooning extra sauce over both.

Variations

• •

  With veal: swap chicken for cubed veal shoulder and extend the braise to about 1 hour 15 minutes.

• •

  Dumpling swap: serve over egg noodles or plain rice if you don't have time to make nokedli from scratch.

• •

  Extra heat: stir in half a teaspoon of hot paprika alongside the sweet paprika for a spicier sauce.

Storage

Refrigerate the paprikás and nokedli separately up to 3 days. Reheat the sauce gently over low heat without boiling, and warm the nokedli briefly in a pan with a little butter.

Frequently Asked Questions