Call it Brassói or Csongrádi, not quite sure what came first or if there is even a difference, apróhús or bite sized pieces of meat, originates from the southeast part of Hungary. Since Brassó, the city, was taken away and Csongrád, the county, remained in Hungary, lets just call the dish Csongrádi! If any of this doesn’t make sense, check out the Treaty of Trianon and the city of Brassó. None of this is a personal whim of mine, after all, one of my Hungarian cookbooks also calls the dish Csongrádi, There it is on page 37 of the 2nd addition of "Bogrács és kukta". Furthermore it calls not for beef or veal, the recipe calls for pork meat.
The inspiration could have been leftover pörkölt or maybe a scant amount of pork. I have seen recipes that are 50-50, but in truth the proportion of meat to potato overwhelmingly favors the potato. I have been making a breaded version for years, but it’s more a pretend than the real thing. I had a nice piece of tenderloin so I thought it was time to make an authentic Csongrádi for a change.
CSONGRAD MEATBITES
1 1/4 cup diced pork tenderloin
1/2 cup chopped onions
1 small tomato, peeled and chopped
6 red potatoes, peeled and sliced
1/8 cup lard
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 tsp Hungarian Paprika [mostly for colour]
Oil for deep frying
• Prep the meat, onion, tomato and the potatoes first.
• Melt the lard in a small non stick fry pan.
• Add the diced tenderloin and sauté on medium heat, stirring, until the meat is no longer pink on the outside.
• Add the onions and continue to sauté until the onions are soft.
• Add the tomato and the seasoning and continue to sauté until most of the liquid is absorbed, but do not let it go dry.
• For tougher meats you may have to add a bit of water several times until the meat is tender. Finish the same way, let most of the liquid absorbed but do not let it go dry.
• Cover the meat bits and set them aside.
• Fill a larger pot with hot water and bring it to a full boil.
• Add the potato slices to the boiling water.
• Let the water come back to boil and cook the potato slices for 3 minutes.
• Fully drain the potatoes.
• Heat the oil in your deep fryer, mine is just a large, heavy pot.
• Put on a pair of long oven mitts before adding the still hot potatoes to the hot oil.
• Trust me on this; I had burns from the hot oil splattering up to my hands.
• Once the potatoes are added remove the oven mitts.
• With a large long handed wire strainer, gently stir the potato slices moving to fry them evenly to a golden hue.
• Using the wire strainer scoop the potatoes into a paper towel lined bowl.
• Sprinkle salt, add the prepared meat bits and toss lightly.
• Eat it with pickles or sauerkraut.
• Yields 2 generous servings.
