Captain America: Civil War – Chicken Paprikash
In one of the scenes from Captain America: Civil War, Vision is seen cooking in the kitchen when Wanda walks in. He tells her he’s making paprikash but he isn’t sure if he should add more paprika or not. It was a very sweet scene that suddenly turned sour because Wanda realizes that Vision was there to keep her indoors and away from causing trouble.
I’ve never had or heard of paprikash before but after some research I found out it’s actually a Hungarian dish that contains quite a bit of paprika. It was obvious that Vision was using a printed recipe from Saveur so instead of trying to create something of my own, I kept with the recipe from the Saveur website. It was quite delicious but the amount of paprika took some time to get use to.
Find the recipe here,
http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Chicken-Paprikash-1000079351
Captain America: Civil War - Chicken Paprikash
Ingredients
- 1 tsp - kosher salt plus more to taste
- 2 1 ⁄2 cups plus 2 tbsp. - flour
- 1 - egg lightly beaten
- 1 ⁄4 cup - canola oil
- 1 3-4-lb. - chicken, cut into 6–8 pieces, skin removed
- 2 tbsp. - sweet paprika
- 1 - Italian frying pepper chopped
- 2 - to matoes peeled, cored, seeded, and chopped
- 1 - large yellow onion minced
- 1 1 ⁄2 cups - chicken broth
- 3 ⁄4 cup - sour cream
- 3 tbsp. - unsalted butter
- 2 tbsp. - finely chopped flat-leaf parsley
- Freshly ground black pepper to taste
Instructions
- Bring an 8-qt. pot of salted water to a boil. In a bowl, whisk 2 cups of flour and 1 tsp. salt; form a well in the center. Add egg and 1⁄2 cup water to well; stir to form a dough. Knead in bowl until smooth, about 1 minute. Using a teaspoon, scoop walnut-size portions of dough into pot. Boil dumplings until tender, 6–8 minutes. Drain dumplings and rinse in cold water; cover with a tea towel and set aside.
- Meanwhile, season chicken with salt and pepper. Put 1⁄2 cup flour on a plate; dredge chicken; shake off excess. Heat oil in a 6-qt. Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Cook chicken, turning once, until brown, 8–10 minutes. Set chicken aside. Add paprika and half the peppers, along with the tomatoes and onions, to pot; cook, stirring, until onions are soft, about 5 minutes. Add chicken and broth; boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, covered, turning chicken once, until fully cooked, 12–15 minutes. In a small bowl, whisk together 2 tbsp. flour and sour cream; whisk in 3⁄4 cup of sauce from pot. Stir sour cream mixture into sauce in pot. Remove from heat. Melt butter in a 12" skillet over medium-high heat, add dumplings and parsley, and cook, tossing occasionally, until hot, about 2 minutes. Serve chicken garnished with remaining peppers and dumplings on the side.
I had totally thought that it was a “made-up dish,” like a dish popular in the fictional country of Sokovia since Vision was making it specifically for Wanda to try “lift her spirits.” It totally sounded like something the writers made up, like “ok we need Wanda to need a reason to leave while telling Vision without it looking like she’s asking for permission, since she doesn’t know she’s being held. We’ll have her go to the store! Maybe she needs more of a cooking ingredient — we should have Vision try to cook something for her but he happens to be terrible since he’s synthetic and doesn’t eat. So we should have him make something she knows how to cook, so she knows what’s wrong with the recipe and what it needs so she can run to the store! But it has to be…Sokovian. What sounds like a Sokovian dish? Let’s see…what if Wanda needs to get more paprika, which is used in a lot of Eastern European dishes, and there’s a world of a difference between the usual paprika and Hungarian paprika, so much that I’ve seen an old Hungarian woman loudly complaining to a store employee how they did not carry Hungarian paprika, and she got even more upset when the employee suggested the “regular” paprika and said it probably tastes the same but is cheaper. The woman got irate, saying that the normal paprika stores sell is not the same as Hungarian paprika and how it makes a huge difference. Maybe Wanda should have a line about the paprika Vision is using not being Hungarian or not being “real” paprika — and Wanda will thus have a reason to try to leave the house! Now, we just need to come up with a name for the dish that makes it sound Sokovian. Paprika….paprikash? Bingo! That makes the dish revolve entirely around the “right” type of Paprika, so when Wanda gives Vision’s version a try, she’s not pleased because it uses the “store paprika” and not “Hungarian paprika” — so Wanda will tell Vision that “this is not paprika” and that “she’ll run to the store to get some (real) paprika,” and “Paprikash” is the perfect name for a Sokovian delicacy that relies on the “right paprika.” Then, as Wanda is about to leave to go the store, Vision gets in her way, and that’s when she realizes that she’s under house arrest and can’t even PROPERLY make the one dish that reminds her of Sokovia — Paprikash.”
So I was totally surprised when I googled it and recipe results came up — it’s totally NOT some dish made up by Marvel! I can’t believe that there’s actually a dish called paprikash, since it sounds like a totally lazy name for a dish that relies on paprika, which is why I totally thought it was made up!
The best part: this past weekend, just after realizing it’s a real dish, and having just bought Cap 3: Civil War, which my gf couldn’t watch with me because she was out of the country for work — we made a date night out of watching Civil War while eating Paprikash!
Omg it’s sooooo good!
Just google “Paprikash” and there should be a recipe from allrecipes.com as one of the first results — I highly suggest using it!! Even if you or someone else is a picky eater and won’t try “exotic” or “foreign” foods because of the spices — Paprikash is Perfect because it tastes like hearty American food, like right out of a Campbell’s soup can or a diner.
Some tips:
I substituted chicken broth for water for more flavor
In all seriousness, use HUNGARIAN paprika and not the “typical” paprika, which is Spanish based. Now I understand why even though Vision used paprika Wanda said “I don’t know what this is, but it is not paprika.” There is a very big difference between Hungarian and “regular” paprika, so much that it will ruin your dish. (I don’t know why the recipe didn’t specify, but luckily I read enough reviews reminding me to get and use Hungarian paprika).
Make the dumplings almost like pasta noodles instead of like big fluffy dumplings. It’s your side so it’s important, otherwise Paprikash can be too strong by itself. You can use white rice, regular pasta, or even mashed potatoes as your side dish with Paprikash — it won’t be as “authentic,” but hell, I don’t know about you but I don’t often eat let alone cool Hungarian cuisine.
Again, if you or the other person is a picky eater about new and “weird” foods — just look at the ingredients list. EVERYTHING — other than the paprika — is something you regularly eat and probably already have in your fridge.
Paprikash and Civil War was seriously one of our best “low-key” date nights, because the Paprikash was amazing, the film was amazing, and the company was amazing!
Hope you make this actually not-made-up djsh, and enjoy!
Those are some great tips, thank you! I also thought it was a dish they completely made up but I immediately googled it after the movie and to my surprise, it’s a real dish!
“I can’t believe that there’s actually a dish called paprikash, since it sounds like a totally lazy name for a dish that relies on paprika, which is why I totally thought it was made up!”
I have to reply to this, because this is so funny and… lovely? Your whole comment is so excited and lovely and gave me this huge grin I have right now 😀
Okay, Hungarian grammar lesson! X3 We call it ‘paprikás csirke’. Hungarian is an agglutinative language which means we mainly add suffixes to words. ‘Paprika’ is a noun, but when we add ‘-ás’ at the end, we get ‘paprikás’ the adjective. While cooking, we add ‘paprika’ to the ‘csirke’ (chicken), and then we get ‘paprikás csirke’ which literally means ‘chicken with paprika’ 😀 It seems the English language borrowed ‘paprikás’ from my language and made it more… suitable (‘paprikash’), I guess?
I don’t know if you can imagine how excited I was in the cinema when I heard what those two were cooking 😀 I don’t really like this dish, but I was happy to hear abot it 🙂