Easy Hungarian Goulash Soup — The Weeknight Bowl Babcia Would Approve Of

Wrote and submitted the second RecipeSpinoff piece. "The Sixteen-Hour Vigil: What Smoking a Brisket Taught Me About Patience." It's about the brisket, but really it's about waiting — waiting for dough to rise, waiting for grief to soften, waiting for a dream to be ready. The recipe is my Texas-style brisket: salt, pepper, post oak, sixteen hours, patience. The editor loved it. Running in August. The RecipeSpinoff gig is becoming real — a platform, a voice, a monthly rhythm of writing and cooking and sharing. This is what I was trying to do with the Milwaukee Eats column, but bigger. The audience is national. The stories are personal. The recipes are mine and Babcia's and the space between. Danny's birthday is next month. He'd be twenty-four. I'm already planning: smash burgers at the grave, a beer, the annual conversation with a headstone that never talks back but always listens. Summer in COVID-era Milwaukee is strange. The city is half-open — outdoor dining, some retail, masks everywhere. The lakefront is packed with people desperate for normalcy. Bradford Beach looks like a normal summer if you squint past the masks. Bay View's restaurants are doing outdoor seating and takeout and the ingenuity is remarkable — parking lots turned into dining rooms, sidewalks turned into cafés. I'm using the outdoor taproom at Lakefront as a testing ground. Each week, I make a different pierogi special and serve it on the patio alongside the beer. This week: mushroom and truffle pierogi — wild mushrooms sautéed with shallots and thyme, mixed with a drizzle of truffle oil, wrapped in Babcia's dough. They're earthy, luxurious, the kind of pierogi that makes you close your eyes. Sold out in an hour. Marcus watched them disappear and said, "When you open your shop, I'm investing." I said, "You can't afford me." He said, "I can't afford not to." I don't know if he's serious. But the look on his face said he was. Made a simple dinner at home: kielbasa and pierogi, fried together in one pan, the way Babcia did on weeknights when she was tired. Kielbasa sliced, pierogi halved, everything crisping in butter until golden. A weeknight Polish dinner in ten minutes. No Instagram photo. No essay. Just food, eaten standing at the counter, the way real people eat when nobody's watching.

That kielbasa-and-pierogi dinner eaten standing at the counter — no photo, no caption, just butter and salt and the sound of the pan — reminded me that the most honest food rarely performs for anyone. It’s in that same spirit that I keep coming back to this Hungarian goulash soup: Eastern European to its bones, built on paprika and patience, the kind of thing Babcia would have ladled out on a Tuesday without ceremony. When the city is half-open and grief sits quietly in the background and the week has asked a lot of you, this is the bowl you make not because it’s impressive, but because it’s true.

Easy Hungarian Goulash Soup

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 1 hr 15 min | Total Time: 1 hr 30 min | Servings: 6

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 lbs beef chuck, cut into 3/4-inch cubes
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 large onion, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 tablespoons sweet Hungarian paprika
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon caraway seeds
• 1 tablespoon tomato paste
• 4 cups beef broth
• 2 cups water
• 2 medium carrots, sliced into rounds
• 2 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• 1 bay leaf
• Salt and black pepper to taste
• Sour cream and fresh parsley, for serving

Instructions

1. Brown the beef. Heat oil in a large heavy-bottomed pot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Season beef cubes with salt and pepper, then brown in batches, 3–4 minutes per side. Transfer to a plate and set aside.
2. Sauté the aromatics. Reduce heat to medium. Add onion to the same pot and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened and golden, about 6 minutes. Add garlic and cook 1 minute more.
3. Bloom the paprika. Push onions to the side, add a small drizzle of oil if needed, and stir in sweet paprika, smoked paprika, and caraway seeds. Toast for 30 seconds until fragrant, then stir together with the onions.
4. Build the soup. Add tomato paste and stir to coat. Return the browned beef to the pot. Pour in beef broth and water, add the bay leaf, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 45 minutes.
5. Add the vegetables. Stir in carrots, potatoes, and red bell pepper. Continue simmering, partially covered, for 25–30 minutes until vegetables are tender and beef is fully yielding.
6. Finish and serve. Remove the bay leaf. Taste and adjust seasoning with salt and pepper. Ladle into bowls and top with a dollop of sour cream and a scatter of fresh parsley.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 310 | Protein: 28g | Fat: 12g | Carbs: 22g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 620mg