Lángos and other street food

If you’re visiting Budapest, you might be looking for a cheap and tasty snack that’s typically Hungarian – look no further than the Lángos, pronounced Lang-gosh (I’m sure the Hungarian speakers out there will correct me). We ate Lángos on a couple of occasions, once from a booth on the top floor of the Central Market, which I recommend as a place for inexpensive food at lunch time, and on another day from the cafe at the Palatine Strand baths on Margaret island, along with six plates of chicken livers (but that’s another story!)

Lángos with sour cream and cheese in Hungary

Lángos is somewhere between a doughnut and a pancake, being made from a yeasty dough that’s rolled into balls then flattened by slamming from hand to hand – we watched this being done in the Central Market. Then the flattened pancake is deep fried in hot oil so that it puffs up and is served with your choice of savoury or sweet toppings. The topping with sour cream and grated cheese is one of the most popular and is called sajtos tejfölös, sajtos being cheese and tejfölos being sour cream.

Kürtős Kalács at the Hungarian Arts and Crafts Festival

Another Hungarian speciality you might come across, especially in tourist areas is the Kürtős Kalács pictured above that we saw at the Hungarian Arts and Crafts Festival in August, amongst other places. It’s a milk-dough that is rolled into strips that are then wound around a metal cylinder and toasted over an open fire, just like you might do when camping. The name comes from the funnel inside a chimney that it resembles once it’s taken off the metal spit. Once it’s cooked it is generally rolled in sugar and cinnamon and sometimes nuts and then you can pick strips off the roll to eat – great for a family to share.

Thanks to my Hungarian Friend, János for filling me in on these little details – all I know is that they were fun and tasty to eat!

This article is posted as part of Wanderfood Wednesday at Wanderlust and Lipstick – head over for a tropical breakfast and other foodie delights.

While visiting Budapest we stayed at Art’Otel Budapest

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