Beyond the Goulash

The streets in Budapest are crowded with sandwich boards outside restaurants touting goulash. After our encounter with goulash in Prague I was a little worried about dinner. Thankfully, outside of goulash (which our awesome guide had told us was the most commercialized and poorly prepared food in the city) Hungarian food is quite good.

We found a quiet little restaurant down the street from our hotel in the Castle District of Buda. Wrapped snuggly in blankets to ward off the slight chill in the air, we enjoyed a perfectly romantic meal over candlelight on their terrace.

After a deliciously simple tomato and onion salad, I went with a trio of pork. Hiding in that pile is a small grilled medallion, a rib and a piece of house made sausage…



I just need to stop saying I don’t like sausage because it was my favorite part of the meal, except maybe the mash with spring onions. I do love a potato.

Julie out-ordered me by going with the beef medallions…



We had a bottle of wonderful Hungarian wine, but sadly the candlelight was not conducive for label shots.

Julie ordered a Hungarian beer, Dreher Bak, after dinner and made the claim it was better than Guinness. I, accordingly, took her out into the streets of Dublin upon our return and had her stoned. Kidding, kidding…but no beer is better than Guinness, although it wasn’t bad…



It was a great meal until sadly I decided to give strudel just one last chance for dessert…



Even with the addition of a berry variety, my lowly opinion did not change.

The thing that stood out most to me about Hungarian cuisine is how heavy handed they are with the paprika. I've always used it sparingly, but I have to say that may change when I get back into the kitchen because everything was really delicious.

Thanks, Budapest for a lovely meal with my Wife. It's nights like these that make me so sad to leave Europe.