Frankfurter and kale soup

This is a soup, that every person my age knows very well in Hungary, from the school canteen. A love it or hate it type of food, and I definitely fall into the first category. I love the taste, it's so easy and quick to make, and funnily it's the type soup that goes well with every type of weather, be it warm or cold outside.

The ingredients:

• A smaller kale (around 400g)
• 1 medium onion
• 2 big or 4 medium potatoes
• cornflower
• 200g frankfurters (I usually buy the smoked poultry ones from the Polish deli shop for extra taste)
• 1 bunch of parsley, or chives
• 150 ml soured cream or creme fraiche
• 1 tsp hot Hungarian Paprika paste, which can be bought in Hungarian deli's, or a small spoon of Hungarian paprika powder, (make sure it's Hungarian, as the Spanish equivalents that you can buy at any shop taste completely different
• 2l vegetable stock 

Preparation:

• Prepare the vegetables: peel the potatos and cut them into small cubes, chop the onion, and slice the kale
• Saute the onions on a bit of olive or sunflower oil. When it looks glassy, add the peeled potatos, give it a stir and add tas much stock so that it would cover the potatoes
• Add the kale slices, and add the rest of the stock, just as much that would cover both vegetables, season with salt and pepper (I have used my favourite garlic and herb salt), cook until the potatoes are soft. 
• Place the creme into a lager bowl, and spoon a bit of hot soup on top of it, add a bit of paprika paste and  stir until it becomes a liquid eventually adding more soup to the mixture.
• Stir the mixture into the soup, add the sliced frankfurters, and cook until they are ready, which means, your soup is ready.

Serve with a bit of parsley on top. As it has potatoes I just eat it on it's own, but some might like to accompany it with a bit of white bread and beer.

Bodi's Jokai style bean soup

This is a very hearty authentic Hungarian soup, and  Bodi is the master of soups, so here's his recipe.
The soup was named after one of my favorite authors Mor Jokai who apparently loved this soup so much that the his name stuck with the soup.

Bodi bought the ingredients on a Friday at the Fehervari Street market in Budapest. It's one of those not too interesting buildings from the end of the socialist era in Budapest, but has one of the best farmer's markets in town. With the vegetables bought there Bodi made this amazing dish.

Ingredients:

1 kg smoked pork shank (with bones)
1 pair of hot Hungarian paprika sausages (looks like chorizo and can be bought at Waitrose)
0,5 kg dry beans
1 yellow pepper (the ones you can buy at Turkish shops, the ones that look like a narrow v-shape)
2 tomatoes
2 medium onions
4 bigger carrots
2 white parsnips
1 smaller celeriac
4 cloves of garlic
2 fresh bunches of parsley
Sour cream
Spices: salt, pepper, ground cumin, bay leaf, Hungarian sweet paprika powder
2 tsp plain flour
sunflower oil

It's important to soak the beans at least 8 hours they'll be cooked in water otherwise it will take forever for them to turn soft while being cooked. The next step is to clean the smoked shank, and if it's way too big cutting it to smaller pieces. Boil some water and pour it on the tomatoes so that they could be peeled. Pour cold water into at least 5 l pot so that the water would cover the shank. Place the bones into the pot as well. Start boiling it as if making chicken soup. Put 3 bay leaves, the paprika, the whole onion into the water, and season it with salt, pepper and ground cumin according to taste. When the water starts to boil decrease the gas so that it would be slowly frothing, and leave it like this until the shank gets soft.

While the shank is boiling there is enough time to clean the roots and the remaining onions  including the garlic. Chop the roots and the onion. When the shank is ready take it out from the pot and place it on a plate, but leave the bones in. Remove the bay leaves. Rinse the beans ad place it into the pot with the roots, and boil the soup further on small gas.When the bean is almost soft, place the sausages into the soup for approximately 8 minutes, then tke them out and leave them to cool.

Slice the shank and the sausages, the shank into cubes the sausages into slice, and fry the latter on some oil. Place the shank and the fried sausage slices back into the soup and take out the bones. Use the same pan used for frying the sausages and use the oil that was used for frying and when it's hot enough add two tablespoons of plain flour to which we add the onions, and then the garlic after the minute. after having fried it for another minute, we take the pan of the heat and add the sweet paprika on top. Add a bit of water and stir until the mixture gets a creamy consistency, then add it to the soup while stirring continuously.   Leave the soup to boil for another ten minutes then serve with parsley and sour cream on top.

Hint: if the smoked shank is way to big, put it aside to prepare a lovely other dish. Recipe will follow soon!

Bodi