Paprikás is one of the four foundational dishes of Hungarian cooking, alongside gulyás, pörkölt and tokány, and like the others it begins with onions cooked slowly in fat and a heavy spoonful of ground paprika added off the heat. The traditional meat is chicken; this version swaps it for mushrooms, which take beautifully to the sweet, smoky sauce. Use a mixture if you can — flat field mushrooms for depth, chestnut mushrooms for body, a handful of chanterelles or oyster mushrooms for texture.
Ingredients, for 4: 800 grams mixed mushrooms; 2 medium onions, finely chopped; 3 tablespoons lard or sunflower oil; 2 heaping tablespoons sweet Hungarian paprika, the freshest you can find; a half teaspoon hot paprika, optional; 1 green pepper, diced; 1 ripe tomato, diced; 200 milliliters vegetable stock or water; 200 grams sour cream; 1 tablespoon flour; salt; a handful of chopped parsley or dill. For the nokedli: 300 grams plain flour, 3 eggs, about 150 milliliters water, 1 teaspoon salt.
Start with the onions. Melt the lard in a wide, heavy pan over medium-low heat, add the onions and a pinch of salt, and cook for 15 minutes, stirring now and then, until soft and golden but not brown. This step cannot be hurried; it is where the sweetness comes from.
Add the paprika. Take the pan off the heat entirely. Stir in both paprikas and let them bloom in the warm fat for 30 seconds. Paprika scorches and turns bitter in seconds over direct heat, which is why every Hungarian cook does this away from the flame. Add the green pepper and tomato, return the pan to medium heat, and cook for 3 minutes.
Cook the mushrooms. Clean them with a brush or a cloth rather than water, and cut them into generous pieces — halves or quarters, nothing smaller, because they will shrink. Add them to the pan with a good pinch of salt and stir to coat. They will release liquid; let it cook off for about 8 minutes, then add the stock, bring to a simmer, cover, and cook for 15 minutes.
Make the nokedli while the sauce simmers. Whisk the eggs, water and salt, then beat in the flour to make a thick, sticky batter that just falls from a spoon. Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil. Spread a few spoonfuls of batter on a small wet cutting board held over the pot and, with a wet knife, scrape small pieces — the size of a fingernail — into the water. Work in batches. They are done when they float, about 2 minutes. Lift out with a slotted spoon into a warm bowl with a knob of butter.
Finish the sauce. Stir the flour into the sour cream until smooth, then stir in a ladleful of the hot sauce to temper it. Take the pan off the heat and stir the mixture back in. Return to the lowest heat for 2 minutes to thicken; do not let it boil or the cream will split. Taste for salt — mushrooms take more than you expect.
Serve the paprikash over the nokedli, with the parsley or dill scattered on top and, if you like, a spoonful of extra sour cream. A cucumber salad with a little vinegar and sugar on the side is traditional and cuts the richness. A dry Hungarian white, a Furmint or an Olaszrizling, is the right thing to drink.
A version of this article appears in print on Oct. 11, 2026, Section C, Page 10 of the European edition with the headline: Mushroom Paprikash, With Nokedli to Catch the Sauce.
