What food springs to mind when you think of Hungary? Goulash - of course we had to keep it traditional with a hearty goulash recipe this week.

Harrison is back to writing the facts this week now he's created his world fact book - unfortunatley his brain wasn't very engaged and one of his facts was  list of people's names without actually telling us what they were notable for...

April was so pleased to find the the flag this week was rather easy and was like the Mexican flag but 'without the hard part'.

So seeing as Hungary is famous for goulash, it had to be goulash on the menu. Despite the 'daring' name of the website this recipe came from, the recipe is rather easy to execute - Traditional Hungarian Goulash

Chef's Notes - I couldn't get hold of Hungarian paprika but used a good quality sweet paprika available here in New Zealand. As I was making my goulash in the slow cooker, I also reduced the beef stock to just 2 cups which still resulted in a very saucy dish.

I have memories of goulash being served with pasta from my childhood but this is very western side dish so I opted for something a little more traditional in the form of bread dumplings.

The recipe was a little interesting and the cooking, even more so. Check it out here - Hungarian Bread Dumplings

The Verdict

Harrison - 6/10 - the dumplings taste like pasta but are soggy. Love the goulash and if rating it alone, it would have got a 10/10.

Paul - 6/10 - the whole main was fairly bland but edible - I wasn't wowed.

April - 1/10 - it was disgusting

Danie - 6/10 - the goulash was OK but I also wasn't wowed. The dumplings were bland and soggy - a very odd texture and I won't make them again!

There were lots of delicious looking authentic Hungarian dessert recipes to choose from this week. I was torn between Hungarian Raspberry-Cream Roll (Malna Piskotatekercs) which was like a swiss roll, Hungarian Trifle (Somloi Galuska) and Gerbeaud Cake.

As it's not raspberry season and I didn't really want to spend a couple of days baking different flavoured cakes for the trifle, I opted for the Gerbeaud Cake - a delicious layer of pastry, apricot jam and walnuts with a chocolate topping.

The recipe can be found here - Gerbeaud Cake

Chef's Notes - Note that the prep and cooking times on this recipe fail to mention you need over an hour to chill the cake once the topping is applied...I'd recommend more. This led to us eating the cake slightly warm with a not-quite-set topping.

The Verdict:

Harrison - 3/10 - Don't like the combination of crunchy walnut and apricot jam.

Paul - 7/10 - Was a nice consistency and flavour. It was a bit dry and would have liked some more chocolate topping.

April - 2/10 - I don't like the walnut, jam or pastry bits but like the topping.

Danie - 7/10 - Much nicer than I expected and I loved the walnut and apricot texture. I thought the chocolate topping let it down as it wasn't quite sweet enough to complement the slice.

Update:

Danie - When we had the cake again the following day, it was even more delicious so I'd alter my score to an 8/10.