So you know ALL about the food in Czech Republic. Hungarian food, yeah, it's doesn't kid around either, it means BUSINESS. If you're a vegetarian, you're not going to have the greatest culinary experience, it's just meat meat meat. And the same in Budapest, and Poland. If you want any kind of resemblance of a vegetable, yeah, it's sauerkraut mate (can you tell I've been hanging around Aussies, yeeeeah sweet AS). Anyways, NO vegetables, the ones they do have are usually white, and a little bit sweet, and sour at the same time, not a fan. The place to find the best Hungarian food is at the old canteens from the communist era, far faaar away from them places with their menu in SIX different languages, yeah that's not what you want. The canteens are just big halls with bare tables and absolutely NO frill, you take your tray up to the counter and an old, scary Hungarian lady with a beard shouts something to you in Hungarian, you timidly nod, so petrified you're pissing her off (you DON'T want that) and then relieved to see that you agreed to a massive plate of paprikas krumpli (paprika-based stew with spicy sausage and potatoes). It's ridiculously cheap and REALLY tasty.
The Polish eat these things called Pierogi (I feel like that word deserves to start with a capital "P", that's how awesome it is), they're like a mix between dumplings and ravioli and they come with all these crazy, delicious fillings, it's their version of fast food, it's really cheap and there are self-service places that are open 24 hours, great for when you're wandering the streets of Krakow at 5am after too much of the wodka.
I couldn't write about Eastern European food without mentioning KEBABS, the delightful things. They're mad about them here, it's weird, in Budapest, literally every 5th shop is a kebab shop, urgh (I say that now, but at the 3am the other morning, they were the tastiest things the whole entire world).
Oh, and the Hungarians have this stuff called palinka, it's the most deceptive, sneaky stuff in the WORLD, it comes in a shot glass, you smell it and think, mmm delicous it smells like plums, and then you drink it and you turn into a pirate, one eye closed screaming out GAAAAH, AAAAH, ARRRRR, naaaasty stuff that palinka. Ooooh I still need to write about the ruins bars in Budapest, the most incredible bars that have been set up in old, crumbling abandoned buildings, where you can enjoy your drink sitting in an old vintage car, a bath tub or a go-cart weird furniture hanging on the walls, graffiti everywhere, just a maze of rooms playing different kinds of music, courtyards covered in trees and fairy lights, REALLY edgy. They have THE most epic hubbly smoking areas,for all my Cape Town friends reading this, you would be SO proud of me, all those years of smoking hubbly paid off, so much so that it was almost embarrassing, people were like, WOAH, do you smoke this a lot... ummm, yeah maybe, kind of, ahem, almost every day when I was at uni (said in small whispery voice) Haha. I set it all up and was blowing smoke rings the size of my head in just about a 2 minutes FLAT, yeeeah I'm a champion. After all that time of not smoking I was the BOSS. And yes, I'm still REALLY selfish with the hubbly pipe, so much so that I almost got my own massive one, I mean who wants to share with like 8 other people and have to wait 10 minutes between each smoke. They had the best flavours, yum. Wowzer that place is just the best, my kind of place. Chilling, hubbly, good conversations, insane music, you can hop from room to room and hear different styles, if you want you can dance, or you can smoke hubbly, or chill out in one of the cars with a bottle of red wine, aaah I love it.
Okay bed time, I have a 13 hour bus trip tomorrow, gaaah.
Okay bed time, I have a 13 hour bus trip tomorrow, gaaah.
