OP: Hungarian Cookery

St. Marks Printing Corporation, 1941. Hardcover, recased. Very Good. Fourth printing.

The US saw a surge of immigrants from Hungary—over a million people, according to the US census—in the late 1800s and early 1900s. And wherever immigrants go, cookbooks are sure to follow.

Hungarian Cookery—though first published in 1932 by which time Hungarian communities were firmly established in the US—looks back at the Old World with nostalgia. The recipes are loosely instructive, calling more upon intuition and assumed knowhow than rigid techniques or specific ingredient quantities. They do, however, exhibit the rich tapestry of Hungary’s multicultural cuisine—one that hasn’t been exhausted by publishers in English to date.

Animal proteins take center stage, offal and game particularly prominent within that category. The vegetable, dumpling, and baked goods sections are thrilling in their own right, and should not be missed. Some notable dishes include:

• Hare schnitzel with mushroom sauce
• “Alfoldi style” roast beef seasoned with paprika, topped with sour cream, and served with egg nockerls (spaetzle-like dumplings)
• Mutton and cabbage flavored with caraway and served with gravy, green peppers, and sour cream
• Soufflé a la Budapest—made with rolls soaked in red wine and scented with cinnamon and cloves

Ours, a 1941 reprint, had taken a beating, so we recased it with the original cover laid on. This copy came from the personal collection of food writer and author of some 30 books,  Nika Hazelton (1908–1992) whose ownership signature is on the original front free endpaper. Very Good overall; clean interior.