Goulash Soup

Goulash is a dish, originally from Hungary, a stew or a soup, usually made of beef, red onions, vegetables spices and ground paprika powder.  The name originates from the Hungarian gulyás, the word for a cattle stockman or herdsman.

In Hungary, Goulash is called Gulyás. Gulyásleves is prepared as a soup (leves meaning soup). The dish Gulyás or Bográcsgulyás was traditionally a thick stew, made by cattle stockmen. The Goulash can still be prepared both like a soup and a stew. The traditional Hungarian stews: Goulash, Pörkölt and Paprikas, sharing the same origin, as herdsmens stews, are considered to be the national dishes of Hungary.

Shank, shin or shoulder is used. Goulash derives its thickness from tough, well-exercised muscles rich in collagen, which is converted to gelatin during the cooking process. Meat is cut into chunks, seasoned with salt, and black pepper and then browned in a pot with oil or lard with sliced onions. Paprika, water or stock is added and left to simmer. After cooking a while garlic, caraway seeds or ground caraway seeds and even soup vegetables like carrot, parsnip, peppers like green pepper (or bell pepper), celery and a small tomato may be added. Other herbs and spices could also be added, especially hot chili peppers, bay leaf and thyme  Diced potatoes may be added, they provide starch as they cook, making the goulash thicker and smoother. A small amount of white wine or a very little wine vinegar can also be added near the end of cooking to round the taste. Goulash may be served with thin soup pasta, made of a dough with flour and egg, thinly rolled out on a board. called csipetke[4] The name Csipetke comes from pinching small fingernail size bits out of the dough, adding them to the boiling soup.

Some cookbooks suggest using roux with flour to thicken the goulash, which produces a starchy texture and a blander taste. Others suggest using a vast amount of tomatoes for colour and taste. A small amount of tomatoes in the stock that is used, or a drop of tomato purée, may improve the taste and texture, but the original goulash is a paprika-based dish and the taste of tomatoes should not be discernible. Many Hungarian chefs consider tomatoes to be absolutely forbidden in goulash and they also feel that if they cook a stew instead of a soup, it should only be thickened by finely chopped potatoes, which must be simmered along with the meat.

“Goulash Communism” is used to describe the maverick brand of Communism practiced by Hungary during the Cold War, characterized by some degree of political freedom within the Hungarian Communist Party as well as limited economic freedom and freedom of speech, inspired at least in part by the 1956 Hungarian Revolution.

Minestrone Soup

Minestrone is the name for a variety of thick Italian soups made with vegetables, often with the addition of pasta or rice. Common ingredients include beans, onions, celery, carrots, stock, and tomatoes.

There is no set recipe for minestrone, since it is usually made out of whatever vegetables are in season. It can be vegetarian, contain meat, or contain a meat-based broth (such as chicken stock). The word “minestrone” has become a synonym for “hodgepodge”.  Minestrone is one of the cornerstones of Italian cuisine, and is probably more widely dispersed and eaten throughout Italy than pasta.

Minestrone originally was a very humble dish and was intended for everyday consumption, being filling and cheap, and would likely have been the main course of a meal. Minestrone is part of what is known in Italy as cucina povera (literally “poor kitchen”) meaning poorer people’s cuisine.

Due to its unique origins and the absence of a fixed recipe, minestrone is not particularly similar across Italy: it varies depending on traditional cooking times, ingredients, and season. Minestrone ranges from a thick and dense texture with very boiled-down vegetables, to a more brothy soup with large quantities of diced and lightly-cooked vegetables that may include meats.

Like many Italian dishes, minestrone was probably originally not a dish made for its own sake, though this point is argued. In other words, whereas one might set about killing a rabbit, with the intention of then eating cooked rabbit, one did not gather the ingredients of minestrone with the intention of making minestrone. The ingredients were pooled from ingredients of other dishes, often side dishes or “contorni” plus whatever was left over.

As eating habits and ingredients changed in Italy, so did minestrone. The Roman army is said to have marched on minestrone and pasta ceci (or a European kind of beans and pasta), the former making use of local and seasonal ingredients, the latter due to the longevity of dried goods.[citation needed].

The introduction of new ingredients from the Americas in the Middle Ages, including tomatoes and potatoes, also changed the soup to the point that tomatoes are now considered a staple ingredient (though the quantity used varies from northern to southern Italy).

There are two schools of thought on when the recipe for minestrone became more formalized. One argues that in the 1600s and 1700s minestrone emerged as a soup using exclusively fresh vegetables and was made for its own sake (meaning it no longer relied on left-overs), while the other school of thought argues that the dish had always been prepared exclusively with fresh vegetables for its own sake since pre-Roman times, but the name minestrone lost its meaning of being made with left-overs.

There are three Italian words corresponding to the English word ’soup’: zuppa, which is used in the sense of tomato soup, or fish soup; minestra, which is used in the sense of a more substantial soup such as a vegetable soup, and also for ‘dry’ soups, namely pasta dishes; and minestrone, which means a very substantial or large soup, though the meaning has now come to be associated with this particular dish.