One of the reasons I'm so horrifically overdrawn now is because I had a week off work just before I left Berlin, and so spent a few days in Poland and Hungary, and tried some local delicacies.
No recipes here, just a little travel/food writing.
Alright, admittedly I mostly stuck to beverages in Poland . I'm a great believer in the free walking tour (I've been to a lot of European cities and they've all got 'em.) and the one I took in Warsaw included a trip to a vodka bar in the Old Town.
This is the spread.
Coloured (and slightly flavoured, I think) vodka, bread with lard (!) and pickles. Erm. Delicious?
I was anticipating that nasty, burning-my-oesophagus feeling from the vodka but NO. Probably something to do with this being good, actual Polish vodka as opposed to Morrisions own brand, or some such, but whatever. The tour guide said the proper way to take Polish vodka was with plenty of the aforementioned lard-y bread and pickles so as to avoid being ill the next day (*raises eyebrow*). I know I'm not a pickle fan so I avoided them but the lard bread? Y'know, when in Warsaw - it was actually delicious. Real pork fat with the occasional meaty chunk. Not healthy in the slightest, but that's never a deterrent for yours truly.
On to Budapest.
Sadly, I didn't get to try 'Langos', which I think is deep fried pizza-y thing the tour guide recommended (someone on Trip Advisor describes it as 'fried dough slathered with your choice of toppings including sour cream, garlic, cheese, onion, etc.' Sounds delish, and about how she described it too.) But we did end the tour at a canteen, which they said was a good, cheap place to get dinner; 'the sort of place the blue-collar workers go on their lunchbreak'.
Carb central.
I had pork in mushroom sauce. With rice. And fried potatoes. And bread. And baked onion rings. And the most disgustingly sweet wine ever (bleurgh).
Hungarian Cuisine actually sounds delicious - all paprika and herbs, and spicy creamy sauces and meat and veg and hearty deliciousness. I'm already itching to go back to Budapest - I only had a day there, and not even a full evening in which to experience the bars, which are supposedly some of the best in the world - so hopefully a return visit occur, and I'll be able to try some more yummy food.
Budapest also has 2 Michelin starred restaurants, at which (according to our tour guide) you can get a 3 course meal for around 15 quid at lunchtime.
And it gets LOADS of sunshine, and it's very picturesque, and the Turkish baths are WONDERFUL. Get thee to Hungary.
PS, for non-food based photos of my trip East, see here!
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