Chicken Paprikash

I love learning how to make dishes that have been in my family for awhile.  When I moved to Atlanta I was kind of on my own in the kitchen - but now that I'm back it has been fun to pick my parent's brains and culinary skills to enhance my own.  This particular recipe, Chicken Paprikash, is something that my mother always made.  It is a Hungarian comfort food that isn't necessarily the healthiest of options (what comfort food is?) - but still a nice treat to make every now and then.  Enjoy!

Chicken Paprikash

4 split Chicken Breasts

1 Onion

1 Green Pepper

Water

1 container Sour Cream

Flour

Egg Noodles

Hungarian Paprika

Bacon Zsir (bacon grease/fat)

My mom uses an electric skillet to make this, but any skillet is fine, as long as you can cover it.  I would probably use my Dutch Oven!

 Start by dicing your onion into small pieces ...

And then your green pepper ... 

Now please don't judge me.  That is a container full of saved bacon fat.  I have one in my refrigerator too.  It just has so much flavor!  Anyway, put a couple of tablespoons of the bacon zsir into the skillet, turn up the skillet and let everything sizzle.

Give things a quick stir from time to time so nothing sticks.  Do this until the the edges start to brown.

Once your veggies brown, put the chicken into the skillet.  Brown on both sides.

Once both sides have been browned (not cooked - just browned) fill the skillet with water (so it almost covers the chicken).

And then dump a TON of this stuff on it.  (Note from Mom - you need Hungarian Paprika.  Otherwise this doesn't work.)

Let the water come to a boil, lower the temperature a smidge, cover the skillet and let the chicken simmer for 30 minutes on each side.  Re-season with more paprika when you turn the chicken over.

Once the chicken is cooked, take it out of the skillet and put it in a warming oven.

Then add the entire (yes, entire) container of sour cream to the skillet and whisk everything together.  Add flour until the gravy reaches your desired thickness.

I like thick gravy, so I added a lot of flour. :)

While you're working on the gravy, heat up some water to cook your noodles.

Like so!

Then pull the chicken off of the bone, serve on top of the noodles and smother everything in gravy ...

And dig in!

This is much simpler to make than I thought it would be!  It is a little bit time consuming because you have to let the chicken cook for about 60 minutes, but you can do other things while that is happening.

Good luck!