Budapest Blood Soup

So, yeah. It was Easter morning in Budapest and I had to decide what to do. I knew that there were two general areas in which I wanted to head. First was west, towards the Danube and the other was northeast. I chose west.

To the west was the only metro stop that crossed all three lines – Deák Ferenc tér. I saw a tourist map that showed that there were a lot of historic buildings in the area and I knew that there were bridges in the area that would lead me to and from Buda, on the west side of the river, and Pest, on the east. I was in Pest.

I walked from my hotel to the Deák Ferenc area. It took about 20-25 minutes and it seemed almost like a ghost town. Lots of cities are like that on weekends any way, but this being Easter, it was even more quiet. When I got to Deák Ferenc, lo and behold, I found touristland. There was a pedestrian walkway with a coffee shop (thank God), numerous souvenir stores and restaurants/cafes galore.

Also in this area was a plaza with about twenty-five booths. From the booths, vendors were selling home made products and crafts, along with deserts and coffees. The most interesting booths, however, were the booths in which people were cooking large pans of (I assume) Hungarian food. The smell filled of stewing meats and sauces filled the air and made me hungry. For the most part, the signs were in Hungarian, so I didn’t know what was being cooked – except for one booth that was selling, among other things, Rooster Testicle Stew. I wasn’t that hungry yet, but I decided that I was going to eat from one of the booths when the time came.

Instead of eating, I went to the closest bridge and walked across to Buda. I’m not sure what the name of the bridge is, but it is large, with rows of cables, sort of like a mini-golden gate, and it was completely white. All of the bridges that I saw crossing the Danube in Budapest were distinctive.

I took a little walking tour of Buda and looked at the statues and the Buda Castle and just sort of followed the paths to and from the old buildings and the parks. Unfortunately, as I mentioned earlier, it was Easter and everything was closed, so I couldn’t really stop anywhere. All I could do was take in the sights and take some pictures. I crossed another bridge into Pest and headed towards Deák Perenc to get some food and buy a souvenir or two. The bridge I used this time was a beautiful stone bridge that provided great views of the city along the river. Before I could get to Deák Perenc, I was stopped by an Easter procession that was leading to one of the many old churches on the Pest side of the river. Then, I was on my way.

I returned to touristland and started browsing the booths for what would be my lunch. I opted away from the Rooster Testicle Stew and found a booth that smelled good and had six or seven dishes in various pans that were being cooked as I watched. The dishes all looked distinct, there was an oyster dish and some chicken dishes and some pork dishes. Finally, I decided upon one that smelled particularly good. It looked like beef, but I couldn’t tell for sure. It was a soup-like dish and I ordered it.

When I got my bowl of food, I soon learned it wasn’t beef. I could tell there was a little bit of onion. Mostly, however, the chuncky portion of the soup was about evenly divided between chunks of pork and globs of pork fat/skin, which was languishing in this red sauce that contained little bits of meat that had fallen off the pork. It was a little spicy and the broth was a little thick. The more of it I ate, the more I realized that I recognized one of the other flavors – it was blood. So, without realizing it, I had ordered the pork fat and blood special, but it was good. I guess that’s my diet in a nutshell – give me a pizza or a hamburger with a little bit of corn on it and I’ll complain like a six-year old being served liver and onions, but give me the leftovers of a pig’s liposuction and I’m in hog heaven, so to speak.

I tried a few other Hungarian dishes. Goulash, of course, and a few others, but it will be the blood and pork fat stew that I remember the most. Those were the most exciting parts of my Easter Sunday. (Recall from a last post that I feared I wasted an opportunity in Budapest. I should have got out more on Sunday, but everything being closed sort of put a damper on that.) I think I’ll have one more post of Budapest before moving on.