ÄŚeská KuchynÄ› · The Bohemian Table

Czech Cooking Without Vegetable Oil

Pull up a chair in the old taverns and farmhouse kitchens of Bohemia, where goulash simmers in lard until the spoon stands up in it, dumplings steam under the lid, and every pastry begins with real butter. Honest ingredients and deep flavor, the way the countryside has always cooked.

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Máslo✶ Sádlo✶ Přepuštěné Máslo
A warmly plated Bohemian dish on a dark tavern table
✶ Hovězí Guláš
From the recipe collection
Sádlo

Butter and Lard First

The Bohemian larder was built on sweet butter and golden pork lard. Every soup, braise, and pastry in this collection begins with one of them, never with a refined seed oil.

Pomalu

Slow Braised, Never Rushed

A goulash is ready when the onions have melted into the sauce and not a minute before. We cook the village way, over patient heat, with time as the main ingredient.

Nikdy

Never Vegetable Oil

No seed oils, no shortcuts. Only the traditional fats that the hospody and home kitchens of Bohemia have trusted for generations.

✶
From Our Kitchen

Czech Bohemian Recipes

Six beloved dishes from the tavern and the farmhouse table, each cooked with the honest fats that bring out the best in every ingredient.

Hospoda Hovězí guláš, tender beef in a deep paprika sauce

Hovězí Guláš

Beef goulash with dark lager

2 hr 45 min·6 servings·Medium

The heart of every Czech tavern menu. Beef shoulder braised slowly in lard with a mountain of onions, sweet paprika, and a glass of dark lager, until the sauce turns glossy and deep.

Ingredients

  • 1 kg beef chuck or shin, cut into large cubes
  • 3 tbsp lard (sádlo)
  • 4 large onions, finely chopped
  • 3 garlic cloves, crushed
  • 2 tbsp sweet paprika
  • 1 tsp caraway seeds, lightly crushed
  • 2 tbsp tomato paste
  • 350 ml dark Czech lager
  • 400 ml beef stock
  • 1 tsp dried marjoram, plus salt and black pepper

Instructions

  1. Melt the lard in a heavy pot and cook the onions over medium heat for 20 minutes until deeply golden. Do not hurry this step.
  2. Raise the heat, add the beef, and turn it until sealed on all sides, seasoning with salt and pepper.
  3. Pull the pot off the heat, stir in the paprika, garlic, caraway, and tomato paste, and let them bloom in the hot fat for a minute.
  4. Pour in the lager and stock, scraping the bottom well, and bring to a bare simmer.
  5. Cover and braise gently for 2 hours, stirring now and then, until the beef yields to a spoon.
  6. Uncover, stir in the marjoram, and simmer 15 minutes more until the sauce thickens on the melted onions alone.
  7. Rest 10 minutes and serve with the houskové knedlíky from this collection.
Šumava Pstruh na másle, a butter basted trout fillet with herbs

Pstruh na Másle

Trout in foaming butter

25 min·2 servings·Easy

The quiet pride of the Ĺ umava streams and southern fish ponds. Fresh trout cooked gently in plenty of butter, basted until golden, and finished with lemon and parsley.

Ingredients

  • 2 whole trout, cleaned, or 4 fillets
  • Salt and white pepper
  • 2 tbsp plain flour, for dusting
  • 100 g butter
  • 1 tbsp ghee (pĹ™epuštÄ›nĂ© máslo)
  • A small pinch of crushed caraway
  • Juice of half a lemon
  • 3 tbsp parsley, chopped
  • Lemon wedges, to serve
  • Boiled potatoes turned in butter, to serve

Instructions

  1. Pat the trout very dry, season inside and out with salt, white pepper, and the caraway, and dust lightly with flour.
  2. Warm the ghee with 40 g of the butter in a wide pan over medium heat until it foams.
  3. Lay in the trout and cook 4 to 5 minutes per side (3 minutes for fillets), spooning the fat over as it cooks.
  4. Lift the fish onto warm plates when the skin is golden and the flesh flakes at the backbone.
  5. Add the remaining butter to the pan and let it foam and smell faintly of hazelnuts.
  6. Pull the pan off the heat, add the lemon juice and parsley, and swirl.
  7. Pour the butter over the trout and serve at once with potatoes and lemon wedges.
Zahrada Okurkový salát, a fresh cucumber salad with cream and dill

Okurkový Salát

Cucumber salad with sour cream and dill

20 min·4 servings·Easy

The cool green side that meets every rich Bohemian plate. Thin ribbons of garden cucumber folded into sour cream with dill and a whisper of garlic, no oil anywhere in sight.

Ingredients

  • 2 large cucumbers
  • 1 tsp fine salt
  • 200 ml thick sour cream
  • 1 tsp mild white vinegar
  • A pinch of sugar
  • 1 small garlic clove, grated
  • 3 tbsp fresh dill, chopped
  • 1 tbsp chives, snipped
  • Freshly ground black pepper
  • A few radishes, thinly sliced (optional)

Instructions

  1. Slice the cucumbers as thinly as you can, toss with the salt, and let them stand 15 minutes in a colander.
  2. Squeeze the slices gently by the handful so the salad will not weep later.
  3. Stir the sour cream with the vinegar, sugar, garlic, and most of the dill.
  4. Fold the cucumbers and radishes through the cream until every ribbon is coated.
  5. Season with black pepper, scatter over the chives and remaining dill, and chill briefly.
  6. Serve cold beside roast meats, fried fish, or a bowl of goulash.
Polévka Kulajda, a creamy dill and mushroom soup in a rustic bowl

Kulajda

South Bohemian dill and mushroom soup

50 min·4 servings·Medium

The creamy soup of the southern villages. Potatoes and forest mushrooms in a gently soured broth thickened with butter and cream, crowned with dill and a soft poached egg.

Ingredients

  • 40 g butter
  • 3 tbsp plain flour
  • 1 litre light vegetable or chicken stock
  • 300 g waxy potatoes, diced
  • 200 g fresh or soaked dried mushrooms, sliced
  • 1 bay leaf and 3 allspice berries
  • 200 ml sour cream
  • A small bunch of dill, chopped
  • 1 to 2 tsp mild vinegar, to taste
  • 4 eggs, plus salt and black pepper

Instructions

  1. Melt the butter in a soup pot, stir in the flour, and cook the roux gently until it smells biscuity but stays pale.
  2. Whisk in the stock gradually so no lumps form, then add the bay leaf and allspice.
  3. Add the potatoes and mushrooms and simmer 20 minutes until the potatoes are tender.
  4. Stir a ladle of hot soup into the sour cream, then return the mixture to the pot without boiling hard.
  5. Season with salt, pepper, and just enough vinegar to give the soup its gentle sour edge.
  6. Poach the eggs in barely simmering water for 3 minutes while the soup rests.
  7. Stir in the dill, ladle into deep bowls, and slide a poached egg into each one.
Pekárna Houskové knedlíky, bread dumpling loaves resting on a floured board

Houskové Knedlíky

Bohemian bread dumplings

1 hr 40 min·6 servings·Medium

The pillowy loaves that no Czech Sunday plate can do without. A soft yeasted dough studded with buttery cubes of day old rolls, simmered whole and sliced with a thread.

Ingredients

  • 500 g coarse or plain flour
  • 7 g instant yeast
  • 1 tsp salt
  • A pinch of sugar
  • 250 ml lukewarm whole milk
  • 1 egg
  • 3 day old white rolls, cut into small cubes
  • 2 tbsp butter, for toasting and brushing
  • Salted water, for simmering
  • Extra flour, for the board

Instructions

  1. Toast the roll cubes in the butter until pale gold and set them aside to cool.
  2. Whisk the flour, yeast, salt, and sugar, then add the milk and egg and knead 8 minutes to a smooth, supple dough.
  3. Fold in the toasted cubes, cover, and let the dough rise about 1 hour until doubled.
  4. Divide in two and shape each half into a plump loaf on a floured board, then rest 15 minutes.
  5. Slide the loaves into a wide pot of gently simmering salted water and cook 18 to 20 minutes, turning once halfway.
  6. Lift them out, prick each loaf a few times so the steam escapes, and brush with butter.
  7. Slice with a taut thread, never a knife, and serve warm under goulash or roast meat.
PosvĂ­cenĂ­ LĂ­vance, small golden yeast pancakes stacked with jam and cream

LĂ­vance

Yeast pancakes with plum jam

1 hr 15 min·4 servings·Easy

The sweet reward of a Bohemian feast day. Small yeasted pancakes fried in butter until puffed and golden, then crowned with dark plum jam, sweet cheese, and a spoon of cream.

Ingredients

  • 250 g plain flour
  • 7 g instant yeast
  • 1 tbsp sugar
  • A pinch of salt
  • 250 ml lukewarm whole milk
  • 2 eggs
  • Finely grated zest of half a lemon
  • 60 g butter, for the pan
  • Plum jam (povidla), to serve
  • Sweet tvaroh or soft fresh cheese and sour cream, to serve

Instructions

  1. Whisk the flour, yeast, sugar, and salt in a large bowl.
  2. Beat in the milk, eggs, and lemon zest to a smooth, thick batter.
  3. Cover and let the batter rise 45 minutes until bubbly and doubled.
  4. Melt a knob of butter in a heavy pan (or a lĂ­vance pan if you have one) over medium heat.
  5. Drop in small rounds of batter and cook about 2 minutes per side until puffed and deep gold, adding butter as needed.
  6. Keep the finished pancakes warm under a cloth while you fry the rest.
  7. Stack onto warm plates and top generously with plum jam, sweet cheese, and sour cream.
A rustic table set with warm home cooked dishes
Our Kitchen

The Kitchen Behind Pgomar KuchynÄ›

Pgomar KuchynÄ› is a small home kitchen devoted to the cooking of Bohemia, the land of dark taverns and bright wheat fields, where lunch begins with soup, arrives with dumplings, and always ends with something sweet from the oven. We write these recipes down the way they are still cooked in village kitchens and hospody, patiently, precisely, and with a generous hand on the butter.

Our only house rule is an old one: butter from the dairy, sádlo rendered slowly on the back of the stove, ghee clarified over a low flame, and nothing else. Vegetable oil never comes through our door, because it never sat on the tables we learned from.

Dobrou chuĹĄ, and may your table be full.