Paprikás kattancs

by | Jun 2, 2023 | Breads, buns & biscuits

Paprikás kattancs is a folded milk loaf, which is spread with oil and sprinkled with salt and paprika. It was a gastronomic speciality of peasant society in Gúta, a small Hungarian inhabited settlement in Slovakia, near the Hungarian border. Kattancs used to be eaten with soups, especially bean soup, and mainly on Saturdays. The 200 year-old recipe of kattancs was brought to Békés county after World War II, during the Czechoslovak–Hungarian population exchange, when farming families from Gúta were forcibly transferred to South-Eastern Hungary.

Paprikás kattancs
Paprikás kattancs – photo: zserbo.com

Ingredients:

For the dough:

  • 500 g (~4 cups) flour
  • 40 g (~1 1/2 oz) lard
  • 10 g (~2/3 tbsp) salt
  • 10 g (~2/3 tbsp) sugar
  • 25 g (~3/4 oz) fresh yeast (2 tsp dry yeast)
  • 350 ml (~1 1/2 cups) milk

For the filling:

  • 4 tbsp oil
  • 3 tbsp sweet paprika powder
  • salt

Dissolve yeast and sugar in lukewarm milk.

In a bowl combine flour and salt, then rub in lard. Pour in the yeast – milk mixture, and with the kneading hooks of a mixer knead the dough until soft and pliable. Cover and leave it to rest for 30 minutes.

photo: zserbo.com

Turn out the dough onto a floured surface and flatten it with your hands into a 1-1,5 cm / 1/2 inch thick rectangle. Spread 2 tablespoons of oil on the top. Sprinkle salt and 2 tablespoons of paprika over it. Fold 1/4 of the dough to the middle both on the left and right side.

photo: zserbo.com
photo: zserbo.com

Spread 1 tablespoon of oil on the dough again, then sprinkle salt and paprika over it. Fold the bottom third of the dough to the centre, then fold the upper third over that. Turn the dough upside down and place it on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Brush the dough with 1 tablespoon of oil and let it rise for 30 minutes.

photo: zserbo.com
photo: zserbo.com
photo: zserbo.com

Preheat the oven to 200°C / 392°F and bake the pastry for 35-40 minutes or until golden brown.

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Hungarian cottage cheese

This is what Hungarian túró looks like

You often ask me what kind of cottage cheese (or curd cheese or farmer's cheese - call it what you want) I use in the recipes. In Hungary the store-bought cottage cheese is dry and crumbly as you can see in the picture. So if a recipe calls for túró, I mean this type. If you can't obtain túró, you can try to make your own from whole milk. Click on the link below.

Metric system vs cup

In Hungary metric units are in use, all the recipes on this website are based on this system, so a kitchen scale is necessary. Since I’m not familiar with cup as a measurement unit, I convert grams to cups by using an online converter. The values in brackets, therefore, are only approximate volumes, so, please, double-check them before you start cooking.

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