The Taste Hungary Blog is authored by a group of expat and local writers, intent on making sense of Hungary’s traditional foodways, its emerging wine industry, and Budapest’s food scene. We focus on telling the stories of the deliciously complex foods and wines of Hungary, the people and places that fascinate us, and all of the cultural details which make Hungary such a memorable place to visit (or live).
I was hungry, but I guiltily kept walking, on my way to stock up on cleaning supplies. I am sure I’m not the only one who has performed this kind of quick calculation: weighing the options between sup...
Here's what's changing with us. Our tours are halting, but we are still selling Hungarian wine. (We think you might need it, and we certainly do!)
Day drinking isn’t just for degenerates, miscreants, and stag parties; it can also be a sign of a person who takes pleasure in a bit of transgressive but legal fun. It is possible to get classily slos...
Twenty questions about Hungarian wine with Matthew Horkey and Charine Tan—the duo of globetrotting wine writers behind Exotic Wine Travel.
Palacsinta, in case you don’t know, are a beloved Hungarian flat cake that can be stuffed with fillings both savory and sweet. It of course looks nothing like a pancake. While it has minor differences...
Look south to Szekszárd for some of Hungary’s most elegant and spicy red wines. It's one of the strongholds of Kékfrankos, Kadarka, the Bikavér (Bull’s Blood) blend.
The quality of the produce and the diversity of food stands at the Lehel Market is exceptional, and we could have easily listed many more highlights.
Villány is the home of big bold reds, which are generally based on the Bordeaux varieties of Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Cabernet Franc. One of Hungary’s most popular red wine regions, it boasts s...
We just launched our latest project—an online wine shop and Hungarian Wine Club in the US. It has been a long time coming. But if I trace it back, it was my first visit to Hungarian vineyards that spa...
Somló is one of Hungary’s emblematic historical wine regions. Its unique, mineral-rich terroir, indigenous varieties and numerous small producers make it one of Hungary’s most exciting white-wine regi...
The eight settlements in the Kál Basin also fall within the boundaries of three other wine regions, but due to its unique volcanic landscape and historical relevance, it has boasted its own 453-hectar...
The complicated story of Csíki Sör (Csíki Beer), from Transylvania to Hungary.
The craft beer revolution has brought lots of excitement to Hungary's beer scene, but Hungary's history of beer brewing goes back to the nomadic Magyars. And Budapest's Kőbánya neighborhood is still h...
The Hungarian craft beer revolution began not long after a few friends spent a long night drinking and grumbling over the bad local beer.
Adventures in krumplis tészta (potatoes with pasta), with a recipe.
There is always something delicious (and local) to drink in Hungary. The drinks that inspire the most pride in Hungary have also been named Hungarikums.
If you spend time in Hungary, sooner or later you’ll hear talk of ‘Hungarikums.’ As any traveler will quickly learn, Hungarians are proud (and fiercely protective) of their natural treasures, achievem...
Served throughout Hungary (as well as in Slovakia, Austria, and Northern Italy), körözött is a simple paprika-spiked cheese dip. It’s typically part of a Hungarian appetizer spread, offered with chunk...
In Hungary the most common types of cheese are young and fresh ones. In this category túró is definitely the most popular, accounting for half of all cheese consumed in the country.
You know it’s summer when you see jars of kovászos dill pickles fermenting in sunny window sills. That summery pickle flavor can also come in the form of a drink, concocted with the juice from the pic...
Badacsony is one of Hungary’s iconic regions. Along with Tokaj and Somló, it was famed for its characterful, full-bodied, minerally, white wines from volcanic soil. The wines are unique, concentrated,...
Lake Balaton, the largest lake in Central Europe, is landlocked Hungary’s sea. It is not only a favorite destination for vacationers, but a robust wine region comprises six districts with Protected De...
There's no better way to enjoy the summer's seasonal fruit bounty than in a cold fruit soup. There are lots of variations, but sour cherry soup (meggyleves) is perhaps the most popular. It's a tart so...
Szalonna is an essential food staple in Hungary. Its recipe is very simple—you add salt, smoke, and time to a piece of pork fat. But there are many different types (depending on the cut of meat, the s...
The countryside to the north of Székesfehérvár and Lake Velence hides a small wine region little known outside Hungary. What’s more, this undiscovered region conceals a white variety that few will hav...
Pogácsa, which usually gets a loose translation as ‘scones’ or ‘biscuits,’ are everywhere in Hungary. Pogácsa, or ‘pogi’ for short, also seem to be compulsory for most organized social gatherings.
At the beginning of the 20th century Hungary was second only to France in sparkling wine production ... Happily, the last few decades have seen great advances in Hungarian sparkling wine, and many win...
Production remains limited, but once you’ve tasted Kéknyelű, you’ll understand why it was such a popular and expensive wine in its heyday. Kéknyelű’s high acidity, relative neutrality and serious extr...
We hesitate to call zsemle beloved, they are definitely depended upon. More convenient than a kilo or half kilo of your standard Hungarian loaf of bread, not mass produced yet inexpensive enough to be...
Hárslevelű has been around for centuries and is planted across much of Hungary—notably in Tokaj and the tiny region of Somló. Despite its many good qualities, it seems destined to play a supporting ro...
Hekk is a curious fish to find in Hungary, as it is a sea fish, and Hungary is a landlocked country. How hekk became so popular locally is still a bit murky. WHat is not disputed is that the most Hung...
Hungarian and Austrian history has been so intertwined, for better or for worse, over four centuries. So it’s inevitable that some grape varieties have also crossed today’s borders, and have comfortab...
This guide will help you understand some of the essential Tokaji concepts, decode the important vocabulary you will find on a bottle of wine from Tokaj, and just generally put the nuances of the regio...
Főzelék is a lunchtime staple as much as any gulyás or paprikás. It is the unheralded anchor of any étkezdé’s (lunch canteen) menu. It’s popular with good reason, and taken very seriously.
In a country renowned for its beautiful baked goods, the glistening and golden-tinted Dobos torta is arguably Hungary’s most famous layer cake.
Hungarian food is closely tied in with the country’s literature, and perhaps no other writer captures the romance of the early-20th-century Budapest café society and the magic of Hungarian food better...
A good csontvelő (bone marrow) is worth a trip across town for, worth planning an evening around. You may have to, because it is not the easiest dish to find.
Hungary boasts two related white varieties which are often confused, and have unclear origins. Királyléanyka, which translates as ’princess’ and Leányka, which means ’maiden’ or ’girl’.
arcelona has Gaudi—whose masterfully whimsical buildings dot the city—and Budapest has Ödön Lechner, the father of the Hungarian Secession movement, which was Hungary’s brand of art nouveau.
Wine aficionados have long known of the delights of Furmint, especially in the form of the delectably sweet Tokaji Aszú, and increasingly over the last decade or two in its latest dry incarnations.
udapest is undoubtedly one of the world’s great spa cities. And its historic bath houses are among the city’s most unique attractions, each with its own unique characteristics.
The variety of bottled water available in Hungarian shops is wide to the point of being bewildering, but mineral water doesn’t only come bottled. You can get an even more intense mineral water by goin...
In Hungary, Portugieser has made its home in Villány, but is also found in the Kunság and Eger. It’s an early-ripening variety with thin skins. Its soft tannins and pronounced fruit aromas mean it doe...
You can see why Jokai was so taken with the soup. Jókai bableves has a rich, nourishing flavor that intoxicates and demands to be overindulged in. The meal is hearty in the truest sense of the word. W...
Two 20th century Hungarian white crossings have proved remarkably popular in the last few decades—Irsai Olivér and its offspring, Cserszegi Fűszeres, dubbed the unpronounceable grape by one British Ma...
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Bikavér is probably still Hungary’s best-known red wine, despite the indignities it suffered during the second part of the 20th century. But most wine drinkers, even Hungarian ones, have no idea what ...
The thing about frog legs is that you can’t dither. If you are fixing to get frog legs, you shouldn’t hesitate. For one thing, they are a very easy dish to talk yourself out of. For another, even plac...
Eger has long been known for its blends, principally red Bikavér (aka Bull’s Blood). Since 2010, the region also has a white blend, Egri Csillag. Both are named after historic events in the region.
It’s no longer a secret that Hungary is a great wine producing country. But it is not as widely known that Hungary is also a big producer of high-quality oak barrels. Hungarian oak has been used for m...
Imagine a supernaturally concentrated Aszú with flavors of ripe peach, orange, white flowers, passion fruit, ginger, quince, apricot, and spicy marmalade. It’s thick and syrupy with razor-sharp acidit...
Is there any commonly eaten food more divisive than liver? Loved and loathed in equal measures, it is also the cheapest cut at the market but the most expensive item on the menu. Banned, fetishized, r...
Túró Rudi is one of those acquired tastes, but once acquired, impossible to shake.
udapest is a drinking city, with some very good dive bars. To help you cut to the chase when it comes to finding some divey fun, we have compiled a list of some of the best Budapest has to offer.
It’s strange to think that wines that can be compared to lusciously sweet Sauternes or nutty, saline sherries should not be the flagship wines of a region. Yet, that is the case in Tokaj. Szamorodni i...
For Taste Hungary’s 10th birthday, I’ve looked back at some of the key moments of our first decade and some of the things I’m most grateful for … one for each year.
In the EU wine is classified into categories based on its origin. Learn how this all translates in Hungary, and what you should look for when deciphering a Hungarian wine label.
Due to its heaviness, lángos is a meal best eaten when it has been worked for in one way or another. Dough deep fried, brushed with minced garlic and topped with various other fatty delights like smok...
In a country where meat—be it beef, pork, turkey, or goose—is consumed with gusto, the rooster's family jewels are just another juicy delicacy served in a heady paprika broth.
The spicy condiment known as Erős Pista—a thick paprika paste—is so omnipresent in lunch canteens (étkezdék), Hungarian restaurants, and in home kitchens that there is little room for artisanal interl...
In Hungary, you’d be doing yourself a disservice for the rest of the year if you didn’t eat plenty of lentils to ring in the new year.
Winemakers in the south of Hungary, however, are taking Cabernet Franc very seriously. In fact, the region of Villány is now betting on the variety as their regional flagship.
Gesztenyepüré is a beloved Hungarian dessert. While you can get it year round, chestnuts are seasonal, so its flavors resonate most in autumn. There is something of a nostalgic feel to the dessert, at...
Halászlé (fisherman’s soup) is an iconic paprika-spiked Hungarian dish, prepared for centuries by fishermen and their families along the banks of the Danube, Tisza rivers, and Lake Balaton (or whereve...
Mulled wine (forralt bor) is an inextricable part of winter in Hungary.
The way that celebrating Hanukkah shifted from being a big social event to an intimate family gathering, as it is today, shows how Jews regained their religious consciousness. The importance of food a...
A bottle of Tokaji aszú holds deep history, fascinating myths, much hard work, centuries of passion, and plenty of sheer luck.
In Tokaj the grapes are harvested several times, to make wines of varying levels of sweetness. If the noble rot has developed there will be an aszú harvest in which the berries are selected by hand, o...
Kékfrankos is planted in most Hungarian wine regions, and goes by many different names. When well made, the variety—with its crunchy red and black cherry fruit and spicy kick—is generally a crowd-plea...
The craft beer scene in Hungary was slow to develop, but once it began to take off, it changed the face of beer drinking in Budapest. Tamás Nyaras of Balkezes Sörfözde, discusses the current local cra...
Juhfark is a little-known Hungarian grape variety that is attributed with extraordinary abilities.
There is a lot to be said for going offline to walk around and follow your instincts when exploring a new culture’s culinary scene. It’s one of those micro-adventures that make travel so rewarding. Th...
Vibrant and elegant or rustic and insipid? Little-known Kadarka certainly divides opinions when tasted for the first time, with those who love it praising its crunchy, bright red fruit and refreshing ...
Unicum is a national institution in Hungary, and has a long history that in some ways mirrors the history of modern Hungary itself.
Hungary’s second largest winemaking region is blessed with an ancient winemaking heritage, volcanic soil, successful large wineries, and now a band of boutique wineries hoping to bring the region into...
Flódni is a traditional Hungarian Jewish confection. With fillings of poppy, walnut, apple, and plum jam, separated by five layers of sweet pastry, its flavors of tart, bitter, and sweet meld together...
Olaszrizling, Hungary’s most widely planted white grape variety, is an archetypical Central European variety which is capable of for more than it's usually given credit for.
We’re not saying it’s a good idea to buy under-the-counter pálinka, but if that’s what you want, you should know how to go about getting it.
With cafés like Centrál and New York giving shelter and comfort to writers of the famous Nyugat movement of Hungarian writing, you can’t talk about a classic Hungarian café without mentioning the writ...
Imagine a landscape with numerous giant volcanoes spewing out lava and ash and a receding, bubbling inland sea. This was Hungary ten or fifteen million years ago.
In Budapest, some dishes go out of style, only to be re-introduced years later as more expensive ‘retro’ fare. It also happens that some dishes disappear not to be seen again.
More than fortification for the coming party, the midnight cabbage represents a kind refusal to give in.
Though Hungarians’ fondness for horse meat is far from universal among the population, a demand for it persists and horse sausage is still commonly found at market halls around Budapest.
If nostalgia had a taste, it would be that of a bitter, robust sip of coffee served at Centrál Café, or one of the other coffee houses in Budapest.
Lecsó as a noun is known in flippant company as the Hungarian ratatouille, the dish that's not really a stew, not a soup, not exactly a side dish, but somehow takes characteristics of all these.
Every now and again a word gets mistranslated, and that mistranslation is picked up on and replicated until it’s been hopelessly absorbed into common usage.
Winemakers in Tokaj are singularly obsessed with a fungus called botrytis. And I had become fascinated by these winemakers who go to such lengths and expense to make this traditional wine.
Gulyás is the one Hungarian dish that most people think they know. But their imagination of gulyás rarely resembled the real Hungarian thing.
If you haven’t heard of Mangalica, don’t feel left out. The fact that there is any of it at all is a small miracle.
When the weather gets hot in Hungary, fröccs season is on. A refreshing mixture of soda water and wine, it's the ultimate summer go-to drink.
There’s no other grape that can make such complex sweet wines, consistently delicious easy-drinking dry wines, and full-bodied single vineyard terroir-driven wines.
My first ever trip to Hungary coincided with cherry season. Ever since, when I think cherries, I crave this cherry cake that Gábor’s mother bakes throughout the summer.
A Hungarian cold plate (“hidegtál”) is a classic way to showcase the wide variety of charcuterie which butcher shops, market stalls, and kitchen pantries are brimming with.
With its cavernous interior, the vast three-level Central Market Hall should be a spot of pilgrimage for any food-lover coming to Budapest, where you can spend hours shopping and snacking.
The 1956 vintage was a good one in Tokaj. But 1956 didn’t go down in the history books for the great quality of botrytis in Tokaj, rather because of the revolution that began on October 23rd.
The concept of ‘street food’ is now a global phenomenon. But while backpackers munch on pulled pork sandwiches and tacos, the real local street food is going largely unnoticed by those who are not Hun...
If there is one ingredient that Hungary is undeniably associated with, it's paprika. It symbolizes Hungarian cuisine and is an essential component of some of the best-known Hungarian dishes.
This story of how the Hungarian (and Central European) wine trade functioned before the two world wars and communism is not a well-known one.
Those who grew up during the Communist era in Hungary will know these Hungarian sweets well (although some may never want to taste again).
At Rosenstein, solét is a hearty, wonderfully-prepared meal that not only deserves a pilgrimage but also clearly underlines the restaurant's motto: everything is kosher that tastes good.
We've compiled what we think are the most essential (and tastiest) food, drinks, and experiences that just cannot be missed. We hope you can check all of them off!
The knobby quince has never been one of the most popular fruits. But come autumn, this humble and rather unattractive fruit is transformed into an anticipated seasonal delicacy.
In Hungary, this hot stretch of summer in which the city empties and not much happens is known as cucumber season. The markets, of course, are also full of small, bumpy cucumbers.
Paprikás csirke is a staple of home-cooking and at étkezdes (lunch-rooms), yet it is an elegant dish (but much simpler to prepare than its thick, complex, flavorful sauce suggests).
Lying low at the foot of the Árpád híd, Kórház utcai Market is a vital and yet lesser-known part of Budapest's ingrained market culture.
Galuska are the preferred accompaniment for pörkölt and paprikás, and are also often served with eggs and lettuce for a super-simple lunch at the étkezde.
If your grandmother made this dish for the holidays, you either loved it or hated it. There's pretty much no middle-ground, and there's no denying the lingering memory of this shimmering meat jelly.
Though making homemade pasta for a soup might sound very time-consuming, it’s actually quite quick and simple.
Hungary's love of coffee is grounded in history. And gourmet java lovers have plenty of cafes where they gather to sip their favorite bitter brew.
You can tell Christmas is coming in Hungary when cukrászdas begin stockpiling bejglis. Whether filled with poppyseed or walnuts, these cylindrical shaped cakes are the essence of Hungarian Christmas.
Sunday lunch is practically a sacred ritual in Hungary. This I learned when I found myself sitting at a table set under towering chestnut trees, eating the kind of meal I usually only ate on holidays....
Here are some of our favorite Hungarian tunes—an eclectic mix of everything from folk, jazz, and Jewish to rap, pop, and Gypsy music—to get you in the Hungarian spirit!
Get your kitchen Magyarul in gear with this useful culinary dictionary.
Get your kitchen Magyarul in gear with this useful culinary dictionary.
Homemade, flaky pogácsa is the quintessential Hungarian snack, eaten at all times of the day and on any occasion.For the best, many Budapesters swear by Daubner Cukrászda.
What happened before the takeover of the state-owned coops in Hungary, which lasted more than forty years (and devastated Hungarian wine)?
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