2022 Giro d’Italia - Stage 1: Budapest to Visegrád
Welcome back to my 2022 Culinary Ridealong series which starts, this year, with the Giro d’Italia! However, as you will note above, the Giro is starting in Hungary this year. If unfamiliar, prior to Covid, it was sometimes normal for these major road races to start in a nearby country. Last year saw a return to the normal racing schedule (Giro/Le Tour/Vuelta), and now that Covid has transitioned to endemic-status, and international travel restrictions have eased, normalcy has just about returned. So, I will have a few Hungarian treats for you prior to the Giro returning to Italy for Stage 4 on Tuesday.
However, I wanted to avoid the traditional dish that everyone thinks of when it comes to Hungary: goulash. I’m not knocking the dish, it has a rich history, and is delicious. I just wanted to do something different and I am going to highlight 3 knockout traditional meals that are not goulash…or another famous Hungarian dish: chicken paprikash. Today’s dish is in honor of the Jewish heritage in Budapest. Prior to, including several years leading up to, WWII, Jews accounted for about 5% of the populace of Hungary. Post-war, many Jews converted to Catholicism and now, Jews only account for about 1/10 of 1% of the population, most living in Budapest, the starting city of this year’s Giro d’Italia.
Cholent, is a traditional Jewish-Hungarian stew (the dish traces back to 516 BC in Judea!) that includes beef brisket, goose, bone marrow, and eggs. The beauty of this dish is that it would be prepared on Friday, prior to sundown, and allowed to cook slowly overnight and then eaten at lunchtime on Shabbat (Saturday afternoon). If you’ve learned to know any constant of mine, it’s that I love slowly cooked food. However, I opted for a more-typical, but still “slow cookery” method to this meal, and I even smoked my own duck breast. I snuck in a piece before cooling it, and it was absolutely fantastic on its own. I hope you enjoy this and all the meals to come!
Cholent
~1 lb smoked duck breast (recipe below)
1 cup of Roman beans (or other red beans, but not kidney beans)
~2 lbs beef brisket
2 onions, 1” dice
1.5 lbs baby red-skinned potato (whole if small, halving larger potatoes)
1.5 tsp hot Hungarian paprika
1.5 tsp turmeric
1 tsp cumin
6 cloves of garlic, peeled
½ cup pearl barley
2 marrow bone halves
4 cups chicken broth
2 cups beef broth
2 bay leaves
4 eggs
Prior to making the dish, you need to smoke a duck breast. If you’re not using duck (or bought a pre-smoked duck breast), you’ll need a bit of duck fat to start the main preparation.
Soak your beans in a large bowl or pot of water. If you forgot to soak them (like me!), simply place the beans in a pot, cover with plenty of water and bring to a boil for 5 minutes. Cover the pot and remove from the heat, let stand for an hour. Then drain the beans prior to use. If pre-making the beans, store them in an airtight container, with enough bean cooking liquid to cover, and place in the refrigerator.
Once ready to begin the meal, place your smoked duck breast, skin-side down, in an empty dutch oven, and turn on the heat to medium-low. Render as much fat as possible, until beginning to smoke. Then remove the duck breast and set aside to cool. Once fully cooled, wrap in parchment paper and foil and place in the fridge.
Trim most of the fat cap off of the brisket, leaving about ¾-inch of fat. Season the meat liberally with kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper. Place the meat into the pot of rendered duck fat, fat-side down, and brown on both sides over medium-high heat. Remove the meat to a cutting board and slice into ~2-inch chunks.
Once you remove the beef from the pot, pour off all but 1 tbsp of fat. Stir in the onions with a pinch of salt and reduce the heat to medium. Sauté until beginning to soften, then add in the cut-up brisket, along with the potatoes, spices, and garlic. Stir to combine until fragrant, about 90 seconds.
Add in the barley, marrow bones, stock, and bay leaves. Bring to a boil. Cover the pot and reduce the heat to low and simmer for 2.5 hours or until the beef is tender. After 2 hrs, remove the lid from the pot to allow the stock to reduce.
Meanwhile, place the eggs into a small pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil, then cover and remove from the heat. Let the eggs sit for 10 minutes. Then, transfer the eggs to a bowl of ice water and allow to fully cool, about 10 minutes. Drain, peel, and reserve the boiled eggs.
Once the beef is tender, cut up the smoked duck into half-inch pieces and add them to the pot, along with the reserved boiled eggs. Simmer for a few minutes until the eggs and duck are just heated through.
Taste for any seasoning needs. Remove the bay leaves, and marrow bones, and serve in bowls.
Cherry-smoked Duck Breast
Cherry or apple wood chips
1 lb duck breast
Tart cherry juice
Kosher salt
Black pepper
Chinese 5-spice
Soak your wood chips in water for about 30 minutes. Drain and place into smoker boxes and place over one grill burner set to high heat, until smoking (about 15-20 minutes). Only use one burner for this, do not turn on the other burners. If using a charcoal grill, set all the coals to one side of the grill bowl, with the vent holes over the top of the cooler side of the grill.
Meanwhile, score the duck fat in a cross-hatch pattern and brush both sides of the duck with cherry juice. Season with salt, pepper and 5-spice.
When the grill is smoking, place the prepared duck breast skin-side down, as far away from the direct heat as possible. Smoke for about an hour, until the duck registers 140 degrees.
Set the duck on a cutting board to fully cool. Wrap in parchment paper, followed by foil, and place in the refrigerator until ready to use in the cholent.
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