🇭🇺 Hungary
PalóclevesHungarian lamb and green bean soup
A Hungarian soup of lamb (the Gundel original used goat) and vegetables with yellow or green beans and diced potato, enriched with sour cream and paprika and sharpened with vinegar, dill and parsley.
Origin and history
Palócleves is named for the writer Kálmán Mikszáth, born in Nógrád, not for the Palóc people's cooking. According to the Gundel restaurant, János Gundel first made it for Mikszáth's birthday; Gundel's own page gives both 1892 and 1889, Daily News Hungary reports other accounts and says the facts end where the legends begin, and a Hungarian trade magazine says only that it dates from the late nineteenth century. It later became a Gundel classic and, in the second half of the twentieth century, a regular on restaurant and canteen menus.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 6 servings
- Total time
- 1 h 30 min
- Hands-on
- 40 min
Ingredients
- 700 g1.5 lb lamb shoulder, trimmed, cut in 2 cm cubes; keep any bones for the stock
- 1.5 l1 1/2 quarts lamb or chicken stock, hot; or water with the lamb bones
- 400 g14 oz yellow wax beans or green beans, cut in 3 to 4 cm pieces
- 400 g14 oz potatoes, peeled, diced
- 1 onion, chopped
- 1 tbsp lard or oil
- 1 tbsp sweet paprika
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1 tsp caraway seeds
- 2 bay leaves
- 200 g3/4 cup sour cream (tejföl), whisked with 1 tbsp flour
- 1 tbsp plain flour
- 1 bunch fresh dill, chopped
- 1 to 2 tbsp tarragon vinegar, or white wine vinegar, to taste
- salt and black pepper, to taste
Method
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1. Soften the onion in the lard over medium heat for 5 to 8 minutes, until translucent. Take the pot off the heat and stir in the paprika.
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2. Add the lamb, salt, pepper and bay leaves, then pour in enough hot stock to cover the meat. Cover and simmer gently for 45 minutes, until the lamb is nearly tender.
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3. Meanwhile boil the potatoes and the beans in separate pots of salted water, until just tender.
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4. Add the garlic, caraway, potatoes, beans and some of their cooking water to the lamb, plus more stock if the soup is too thick. Simmer for 10 minutes.
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5. Whisk the flour into the sour cream, then whisk in a ladle of hot broth. Take the soup off the heat, stir the sour cream in, and bring just back to a gentle simmer for 2 minutes.
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6. Add a splash of tarragon vinegar to taste, scatter the dill and serve hot.
Notes
- The Gundel restaurant says the secret is an intense stock made from lamb bones, meat and vegetables, enriched with sour cream; it also uses diced potatoes, yellow beans, turnip and beetroot, paprika and tarragon vinegar. Trade Magazin calls green beans obligatory in all versions.
- The original reportedly used goat (Gundel) or mutton (Trade Magazin, Daily News Hungary); lamb is now standard, and other Hungarian recipes substitute pork shoulder, beef or turkey.
- The sour note comes from sour cream and, in some versions, vinegar: Gundel uses tarragon vinegar, Daily News Hungary says a sourish taste from vinegar, tarragon vinegar or lemon is the key, and Trade Magazin mentions only dill at the finish. Treat the vinegar as to taste.
- Add the sour cream off the heat and do not boil hard afterwards, or it can split.
- Despite the name it is not Palóc folk cooking: it is named in honour of the writer Kálmán Mikszáth, born in Nógrád and known as the chronicler of the Palóc people. Daily News Hungary often calls it the summer version of goulash soup. The version here follows Daily News Hungary's quantities, with Gundel's seasoning.
Adapted from Gundel Restaurant: Palóc soup with lamb, Daily News Hungary: Recipe of the week, Palóc soup (quantities), and Kifli.hu: Palóc sertésragu (sour cream and flour proportions).
At the festivals
No festival we list has printed it on a menu yet.