Grilled Cheese Salad, Khachapuri, Dumplings and CHEESEburger in Budapest!

I am so proud of all of the new things I was able to try in Budapest!!!  I was a little nervous about what food I was going to be able to eat while I was there.  I wasn’t sure what types of food Hungary was really known for but am happy to report that I tried several different types of food while I was there.

For my first day, I started with lunch at this indoor market which took me a little while to find but was worth it once I finally got there.  I was a little overwhelmed at first as I walked around because there were so many different options and most of the menus were in Hungarian so I really had no idea what to get.  At least in Spain I knew a little bit of Spanish and it is similar to French, which I am studying, but I really do not know any Hungarian.  So I walked around the whole place probably at least twice.  I finally decided on which place to order from because it looked pretty popular and I got a grilled cheese with salad.  Well to my surprise what I got was not a grilled cheese made with bread and a salad on the side but actually a square of cheese that was grilled on top of a salad!   Not what I was expecting but it actually was pretty good.  Probably one of the first salads I have enjoyed a little bit because the cheese was really good and there was lots of it as well as fresh oranges, pomegranates and candied walnuts with what seemed to be a citrus dressing.  The cheese was soft but had a little bit of the smoky grill flavor on the outside and was savory, the oranges were nice and sweet and juicy, lettuce is still just lettuce and is crunchy and a bit bitter, pomegranates were a little bit of sweetness and crunch and the candied walnuts were great, nice and caramelized and nutty.

Some friends and I had dinner at this Georgian restaurant where there were these fantastic cheesy breads called Khachapuri I believe.  The first was so good made with several different types of cheese and a warm fluffy crust and was basically my ideal cheesy bread or cheese pizza.  Nothing new here for foods to try but nice to order and really enjoy straight off the menu.

Then there was also this other Khachapuri cheesy bread with an egg and butter on top of a different type of cheese in a fluffy delicious bread boat and it was also soooo good.  Having the baked egg with it was a little different and I am getting used to really trying the yolk flavor on its own from this which is different than when you have scrambled eggs.  So I really enjoyed both of these! Then we also ordered dumplings which are totally new to me.  I needed to have them explained for how to eat them which is you take the top of the dumpling, take a bite out of it,  suck out some of the juices and then eat the meat and everything inside along with the outer dough part.  The the outer dough part was okay and is kind of like the doughy and kind of stickiness similar to pasta.  I wasn’t a huge fan of the juices so I basically just poured those out after I had the first bite and then I tried the different types of meat that were inside.  They are kind of wet and sticky, a little chewy with the dough and meat together.  It is really just the juice that throws me off because then you also have this liquid going on.  Last but not least was a late night snack which was a cheeseburger.  And when I say cheese burger I mean the part that is the burger is just made out of cheese and is fried.  Then this also had bacon on it and sauce and that pink part is radishes.  So the newest part of this was the radishes.  They are crunchy and a little bit sweet and remind me a little bit of carrots.  There was a lot of sauce on this and the bacon was not as crisp and crunchy as I would prefer but the bread was really good and so was the cheese.  It was an interesting combination.  If you didn’t get the bacon and sauce and radishes on there I am sure my fellow picky eaters out there would be happy to know that there is a cheeseburger out there that could be ordered where the burger is actually just cheese and could maybe order it with just the cheese and bread!  So great!