Mátyás Pince

Budapest, Hungary

One of Budapest's oldest continuously operating restaurants, founded in 1904 at the foot of the Elizabeth Bridge on the Pest side of the Danube. Named after the Renaissance king Mátyás, the vaulted cellar dining room retains its original painted walls and ornate fittings. The kitchen serves classical Hungarian cuisine: gulyás, paprikás csirke, töltött káposzta, and charcuterie plates that include csabai kolbász alongside Hungarian salami and pickled vegetables. Gypsy music plays in the evenings. The restaurant has long attracted both Hungarian guests on special occasions and international visitors drawn by the historical interior. The charcuterie boards here are composed rather than assembled: csabai in thin slices next to winter salami, a pot of mustard, pickled peppers, and dense rye bread.

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Sausages served here

Csabai Kolbász

Békéscsaba, Hungary

Csabai kolbász is Hungary's most exported cured sausage, a PGI-protected product from Békéscsaba in the southern Great Plain. A deep, brick-red exterior comes from two paprikas: sweet for colour and body, hot for the burn that defines the sausage's character. Pork is hand-boned from pigs fattened above 135 kilograms, mixed with garlic and caraway, cold-smoked over beechwood, then air-dried until firm. The result is a sausage you can slice thin and eat raw with bread, or cut thick and cook into stews and eggs. Békéscsaba has been making this sausage since at least 1868, and the Csabai Kolbászfesztivál every October turns the town into a pilgrimage site for sausage enthusiasts across central Europe.

porkHungaryPGI