If you like Hungarian food,
They have a goulash which is very good.
Allan Sheman, Hungarian Goulash #5, 1963

Sometimes you still have to love the Internet.

Our daughter Laury has been telling us for years how she uses her slow-cooker to make easy, tasty, dinners. Back-in-the-day when Barb and I were working long hours we would occasionally cook supper in a  crockpot; the concept of coming home to a simmering stew being very enticing.  But lifestyles changed–and the lure of local restaurants became irresistible. Our crockpot usage evaporated.

Then came the last 7 months. Like all of you, we have been eating 99.9% of our dinners at home and getting more and more bored with our menus. Last week Laury’s words finally sunk in.

I decided to make my crockpot favorite, Hungarian Goulash. We found a slow cooker in the very back of the highest kitchen cabinet and then began the hunt for our crockpot cookbook. It wasn’t on our cookbook shelf, it wasn’t on any other bookshelf. It was not here, it was not there, we could not find it anywhere.

I did the modern-day thing and looked up “crockpot recipes for goulash” online. I found a dozen and chose one to make. Went to Woodman’s, bought the few ingredients, threw ’em all in the pot, and later that night we were eating tender, juicy, goulash. The only problem–what should have been a spicy stew was bland as library paste. Barb and I started reminiscing about the old recipe. Wasn’t there brown sugar and  Worcestershire sauce? And how much paprika?

Following dinner, I had a new mission. I was going to find a copy of that old crockery cookbook, the one with the recipe we loved. I did a Google search for “crockpot cookbooks from the 1970’s” and got a hit! Someone had listed the very same book I wanted on Mercari, a selling website I had never heard of before now. For only 6 bucks!

I signed up, put in my credit card, ordered, and dreamt of goulash. Until the next morning when I received a message from the site. The seller had canceled the sale. SH*T! I went back to my search and found another seller of the same cookbook on the Mercari site, this time for $9.

Wondering if Mercari has a monopoly on outdated cookbooks I offered the same $6 as I had the first time and waited. Success! The seller accepted my offer.  Messages from the site confirmed the cookbook was being sent and yesterday, it arrived, as evocative of 1975 as a cookbook could be.  I tore through the recipes, and there, on page 47, was my recipe for Hungarian Goulash, loaded with brown sugar, Worcestershire sauce, and just the right amount of paprika. The only thing missing was the smudgy ketchup thumbprint I remember leaving on my original copy of the book.

I won’t make the goulash this week. I’ll wait for a cold wintery day when a smoky stew will be most appreciated. Want to join us for dinner–virtually of course!

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Kudos to old Eugene Field School friend and baseball buddy Gary Shulman, the first person to correctly answer the “Layla, Learning to Fly, Closer to Home” trilogy trivia question. The common denominator? All have bird tweets. Way to go Gary–I always knew you were for the birds!

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I haven’t cooked that special dish yet. I’ll probably wait for a snowy wintery day when a warm stew will be most welcome. Care to join us for dinner–remotely of course!

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Kudos to old Field School friend Gary Shulman, the only person to solve the “Layla, Learning to Fly, Closer to Home” trilogy challenge. The common denominator? All have bird tweets. Way to go, Gary!

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Less than a week to go. VOTE.

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