Some people seem to be interested in the food we are eating in each city we visit. Food is indeed very important for sustaining life and we thoroughly enjoyed sustaining ourselves with Hungary’s many culinary delights. Thinking back, Lauren and I are having a hard time remembering what we ate every day. Thankfully I took a lot of pictures to help jog our memories.
A lot of people think of Goulash when picturing Hungarian food. This is an accurate assumption of Hungarian cuisine but you would be remiss in fully appreciating the amount and variety of meat that comprises Hungarian food. Boy do these Magyars love meat. Paprika is the national ingredient of choice but I’d say meat is a close second. You won’t hear me complaining at all but going full tilt on Hungarian food for a month is a good way to pack on some excess lbs or kgs. We had our fair share of goulash and we quickly discovered that everyone prepares it slightly differently. My favorite iteration came in a suspended soup pot with a little flame underneath to keep it warm.
Besides the traditional meat dishes, Hungary has embraced many other meats as well, mostly in the form of hamburgers and kebabs. With the amount of hamburgers advertised on the menus, you’d think that they invented the thing. Maybe they wish they had. Either way, we felt a bit silly ordering burgers sometimes when there are many other thing to try but sometimes nothing hits the spot the way ground cow on a bun does. Especially in a country that appreciates meat, you can guarantee that the burger will be exceptional.
- This happens to be a lamb burger from a place called Montenegro Burger. So not ground cow but you get the idea.
Our ultimate favorite Hungarian dish is something we hadn’t ever heard about before. It’s called Làngos. Làngos or Communist Pizza, is a disk of fried dough with cheese on top or various other toppings. You can get them savory or sweet and varying degrees of quality. My favorite was a gut buster of a Langos piled high with everything from a greek salad. Lauren was partial to the classic combo of cheese, sour cream and garlic. I could see a very successful food truck in NYC serving deep fried saucers of cheesy joy.
We cooked for ourselves a lot as well. It would be ridiculous to eat out every night. It can be challenging to cook for yourself while traveling. We don’t want to waste money on buying all the basics for cooking a meal, nor do we want to eat cup of noodles every night. Sometimes you get lucky with a fully stocked airbnb kitchen with oils and spices to cook with. We had to get creative to cook simple meals and try and use everything we purchased for the month we were there. I could probably write a lot more on travel cooking so I don’t ramble on about it here. We took full advantage of the amazing bakery down the street and made all sorts of grilled cheese for lunches while working.
Just make sure you don’t order nachos…
