Carp Paprikash

Carp paprikash is a traditional Hungarian recipe for carp baked with vegetables, spices and a cream sauce. Give it a try—I hope you will enjoy it as much as our family does!

1. Clean the carp and cut off the tail, head and fins. Rub with salt and coat in flour.

2. Place the head, fins and tail in a saucepan, chop the onion and carrot, pour in two cups of water, add half a teaspoon of salt, and cook for 20 minutes.

Remove from the heat and set aside—the head and fins will no longer be needed; the carrot can be added to the vegetables for baking.

3. Fry the carp on both sides until golden brown. Transfer the fish to a baking tray.

4. In a separate saucepan, fry the chopped onion, add the chopped peppers and let them stew, covered, for about 15 minutes. Season with smoked paprika.

5. Cut the small onions in half and fry them in the same frying pan used for the fish—you can add a little more oil. Remove from the heat, add the sweet and hot paprika and 1 cup of the cooked pepper mixture (the rest can be served as a salad), and pour in the prepared fish stock. Bring to a boil.

Mix the cream with a tablespoon of flour, making sure there are no lumps. Add to the vegetables, lower the heat and cook for a few minutes, stirring. Pour the resulting vegetable mixture over the carp.

6. Bake at 190 degrees for about twenty minutes. For the last five minutes, I raised the temperature to 220 to get a darker crust.

Enjoy your meal!

Culinary note: "paprikash" is one of the traditional dishes of Hungarian cuisine. In fact, paprikash is not a particular dish with a fixed set of ingredients, but a method of cooking.