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Hungarian cuisine is unthinkable without lecho. True, there it is usually served as a separate dish, after cooking with beaten eggs. Smoked meat products are often included in Hungarian food. In European countries, lecho most often acts as a side dish. We have pepper lecho and the hostess's tomato is rolled up in jars and used as a kind of winter salad.
And how many variants of this wonderful dish exist! Everyone cooks Lecho in their own way, its exact recipe simply does not exist. It is believed that you must definitely use bell peppers, onions and tomatoes. They are cut into pieces, spices, vinegar, vegetable oil are added, stewed and rolled into jars. But there may be options, since there are recipes in which only pepper is present from vegetables. In this article we will tell you, how to cook lecho for the winter and give a traditional Hungarian recipe for a hot snack.
Lecho in Hungarian
Real Hungarian lecho is a hot dish. It is probably wrong to give spin recipes without paying attention to a very tasty and easy-to-prepare dish.
Necessary products
To prepare this delicious dish, you need to take only fresh, high-quality vegetables, fully ripe, not damaged by diseases or pests. You will need:
- sweet pepper (necessarily red) - 1.5 kg;
- ripe medium-sized tomatoes - 600-700 g;
- medium-sized onions - 2 pcs.;
- smoked bacon - 50 g or fatty smoked brisket - 100 g;
- paprika (seasoning) - 1 teaspoon;
- salt to taste.
Cooking method
Prepare the vegetables first:
- Wash the pepper, remove the stalk, seeds, rinse. Cut into strips.
- Wash the tomatoes, scald with boiling water, put in cold water for a few minutes. Make a cross-shaped incision at the top of the tomato, remove the skin. Cut into quarters, remove the white areas adjacent to the stalk.
- Peel the onion, wash, cut into thin half rings.
Cut bacon or bacon into cubes, place in a large saucepan, cook until transparent.
Add onion, fry until golden brown, then add paprika, stir quickly.
Put peppers and tomatoes in a saucepan, salt a little, simmer over high heat. Stir so as not to burn until the tomatoes are juiced.
When the liquid has evaporated, reduce the fire and continue extinguishing.
Begin to taste, add salt if necessary. The taste of the dish should be full-bodied. When it satisfies you, turn it off and enjoy the real Hungarian pepper lecho and tomato with bacon.
Cooking options
If you deviate a little from the classic recipe, which the Magyars themselves often do, you can prepare several variations of lecho:
- When you reduce the heat, add 2 tablespoons of wine vinegar and (or) a little garlic, sugar, a few black peppercorns to the lecho - the taste will become more intense.
- Hungarians often add smoked sausage cut into slices or sausages (never raw meat!) To pepper lecho and tomato when the dish is boiled down.
- You can beat eggs and pour them over an almost finished dish. But this is not for everybody, in Hungary, for example, this is often done.
Traditional Lecho Recipe
As we have already said, in each country, lecho is prepared in its own way. The delicious recipe for winter harvesting offered by us is traditional for us.
Set of products
For lecho, take ripe vegetables, fresh, without external damage. The twist should be not only tasty, but also beautiful, therefore, it is better to take tomatoes and peppers in red.
You will need:
- tomatoes - 3 kg;
- onions (white or golden, blue should not be taken) - 1.8 kg;
- sweet carrots - 1.8 kg;
- vegetable oil (preferably refined sunflower or corn oil) - 0.5 l;
- sugar - 1 glass;
- bay leaf - 3 pcs.;
- ground black pepper and salt - to your taste;
- sweet pepper - 3 kg.
Cooking method
Wash vegetables thoroughly. Peel the onions, carrots, remove the core and seeds from the pepper.
Scald the tomatoes with boiling water, immerse them in cold water. Make a criss-cross cut, remove the skin.
Chop vegetables:
- tomatoes and peppers - cubed;
- carrots - in strips;
- onions - in half rings.
In a deep frying pan or a saucepan with a thick bottom, heat the vegetable oil, add the carrots and onions, fry until the latter becomes transparent and begins to brown.
Pour in tomatoes and peppers, salt and pepper, add sugar, bay leaf, mix well, simmer until tender.
Fill sterile jars with hot tomato and pepper lecho, seal tightly, turn upside down, wrap warmly.
When the curls are cool, store them.
Lecho in unripe tomato puree
Using green or brown fruits instead of ripe tomatoes gives an interesting result. We offer you a recipe with a photo. The lecho prepared according to it will not only have an interesting, unusual taste, but also an original appearance.
Preliminary remarks
Please note that below, in the list of ingredients, the weight of peppers already peeled and mashed green or unripe tomatoes will be indicated. Unless you have a special scale, weighing lumps and liquids can be a real challenge. Proceed as follows:
- Peppers peeled from seeds and stalks for making lecho will simply be weighed by simply transferring them to a cellophane bag.
- Find out the weight of whole green or brown tomatoes. Remove the testes and stalks, put them in a plastic bag, and weigh again. Subtract the smaller number from the larger - this will be the weight of the tomato puree. It will not change when grinded in a meat grinder or chopped with a blender.
Grocery list
As in the previous recipes, all vegetables should be fresh and undamaged. Tomatoes are not used entirely green, but dairy or brown.
You will need:
- peeled tomatoes - 3 kg;
- sweet pepper - 1 kg;
- sugar - 100 g;
- salt - 60 g.
Cooking method
Lecho according to this recipe is prepared in two stages. First you need to cook mashed tomatoes, and then move on to lecho.
Tomato puree
To prepare 1 kg of tomato puree, you will need 3 kg of peeled tomatoes.
Chop seedless green or brown tomatoes so they can be easily rotated into a meat grinder.
Place the chopped mass in an enamel pan, bring to a boil, cool.
Take a sieve with holes no more than 1.5 mm in diameter, wipe the tomatoes, put in a clean saucepan, put on low heat.
Boil with constant stirring (so that the puree does not burn) until the original volume is 2.5 times smaller. You will have about 1 kg of finished product.
Lecho
Wash the peppers with cold water. Remove seeds and stalks, rinse, cut along a strip about 2 cm wide.
Pour the mashed potatoes over the pepper, hot. Add salt, sugar, stir.
After boiling, boil for about 10 minutes with constant stirring. Let cool to about 90 degrees.
Heat clean, dry jars in the oven.
Distribute the pepper and tomato lecho in the bowl so that the pieces are completely covered with the puree.
Place a clean towel on the bottom of a wide container with water heated to 60-70 degrees. Place the jars in it, cover with boiled lids.
For sterilization at 100 degrees, lecho prepared in 0.5 liter jars takes 25 minutes, in liter jars - 35 minutes.
After finishing the treatment, allow the water to cool slightly, otherwise the glass may burst due to the temperature drop.
Seal the lids hermetically, turn the cans upside down, wrap them up warmly, let them cool.
Lecho "Family"
How to make lecho tasty and spicy like adjika? Take a look at our recipe. It is prepared quickly and so easily that you can entrust the whole process to a teenager or a man.
Necessary products
You will need:
- large fleshy red bell pepper - 3 kg;
- ripe tomatoes - 3 kg;
- garlic - 3 large heads;
- bitter pepper 1-3 pods;
- sugar - 1 glass;
- salt - 1 heaped tablespoon.
Once again, we remind you that all vegetables must be ripe, fresh, of good quality, especially sweet red peppers.
Cooking method
This recipe for pepper lecho is prepared quite quickly, sterilize the jars in advance.
Wash the tomatoes, if necessary, remove the white spot near the stalk, cut into slices.
Remove seeds and stem from hot and sweet peppers.
Turn the tomatoes and hot peppers through a meat grinder.
For lecho, the recipe provides for the use of fleshy thick-walled sweet peppers. Cut it into pieces of about 1-1.5 cm by 6-7 cm. But such peppers are expensive, of course, if you want to save money or grow ordinary Bulgarian varieties, you can use fruits of any size. In this case, make the pieces larger.
Transfer the chopped pepper and the mass chopped in a meat grinder to a saucepan, add sugar, salt.
Stir, put on low heat.
After the saucepan has boiled, simmer for 30 minutes with constant stirring.
Pass the garlic through a press and add to the lecho.
How long it will take to cook, depends on the thickness of the pepper wall, the thicker it is, the longer the pan should be on the fire. The garlic should boil for at least 10 minutes.
Try adding salt or sugar as needed.
Put the lecho in sterile jars, roll them up, turn them upside down, wrap them up warmly.
Conclusion
We hope you enjoyed our recipes. Enjoy your meal!
