The World Table

An interactive culinary compendium: recipes, lexicon and study

Hungarian · Starter

Körözött

  • Easy
  • 15 min
  • roughly 2 of 4 for cost
  • Vegetarian

rich · silky · herb-fresh · nutty-toasted Leads with richness that coats and comforts, a silken, spoon-slow texture, closing toasted and warm.

Ingredients

  • 250 g juhtúró (soft sheep's milk curd), at room temperature
  • 100 g unsalted butter, soft
  • 60 g onion, grated to a pulp
  • 10 g édesnemes paprika (noble sweet, ground)
  • 5 g caraway seed, toasted and ground
  • 10 g mustard
  • 15 g chives, finely cut
  • fine salt

Equipment

Grater / zester

The skills inside

Dry-pan toasting: spices, seeds and nuts

Allergen screen

Found: dairy · mustard

Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.

Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.

Method

  1. Beat the butter on its own until it is pale, light and holds a soft peak.
  2. Rub the paprika and ground caraway into the butter and let it stand until the butter has gone apricot and smells of spice rather than of dust.
  3. Work in the curd a spoonful at a time, then the grated onion, mustard and chives, and salt harder than feels right.
  4. Press into a bowl, cover and hold in the cold for an hour, then bring it back to cool room temperature before serving.

How to tell it is going right

This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the technique it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.

Dry-pan toasting: spices, seeds and nuts 70 recipes

  • A single layer on dry metal with nothing added: no fat, and nothing else sharing the pan or the tray and competing for the heat.
  • It is kept moving: shaken, stirred, or turned. Anything left still scorches on the face touching the metal while the rest of it is barely warm.
  • It is judged by smell before sight: once it is fragrant there are seconds left, not minutes, and the nose reaches that point well before the colour does.
  • It leaves the pan the instant it is done, onto a cold surface. A hot pan keeps toasting whatever stays in it, and carryover here is the difference between done and ruined.
  • The colour is even and light rather than patchy, with nothing black at the edges: one scorched piece taints the whole quantity it is ground into.

Where it goes wrong It was left alone for a moment while something else was attended to. Dry heat has no margin: the pieces against the metal go from fragrant to acrid inside a minute, and the bitterness cannot be picked back out of a ground mixture.

At the Table

The Pour
Sauvignon Blanc (Sancerre)
Also Right
Grüner Veltliner
From the Taps
Berliner weisse
Zero-Proof
Cucumber-lime water

Green plates want green wines: vinaigrette’s acid meets its match, and the difficult vegetables surrender to Grüner.

Saved on this device and kept across visits: export from My Menu to move them.

Film school

This dish, cooked on camera Search films of Körözött The cuisine, deeper Technique films from the Hungarian kitchen