luxury
Aug 14 '09
First Look: The Emporio Armani Caffé
It's been so long since I first saw the "coming soon" signs for the long-promised Emporio Armani Caffé (follow link for contact details and user info) that I was slightly startled when a friend told me it had finally...
May 21 '09
Can Nobu Swim Where Óceán Sank?
Back on Monday we promised that we would soon be publishing "some seriously meaty restaurant news" about Kempinski Hotel Corvinus Budapest. Here it is: We've gotten confirmation from the hotel's general manager, Marcus van der Wal, that a binding...
Apr 24 '09
Okay, Yes, Costes is Among the Best
With just a few irregular contributors and no real official budget to speak of, this editor is not going to apologize for failing to review every new or notable restaurant in Budapest. But if I was going to act...
Mar 27 '09
Rich Americans, Poor Hungarians Brought Together By Love of Authenticity, Exclusivity
In these days of international economic crisis and discord, it's always nice to hear stories that illustrate how food can build bridges between peoples. This morning, several readers sent over a link to this story in today's New York...
Mar 18 '09
Grandmasters of Wine (II): Why Every Hungarian Waiter Should Have Lunch at the Kempinski
Monday's post about the Bortársaság's "Wine Academy" reminded me to follow up on a related story I've been sitting on for a while. Back in January, I heard that the Kempinski Hotel Corvinus Budapest had just finished putting the...
Mar 05 '09
Restaurant Critic from UK Telegraph Misses Telegram on Local Restaurant Closings
The UK Telegraph had an upbeat piece yesterday about the "new breed" of high-end restaurants in Budapest, Prague and Bucharest. Included among the four reviews of BP luxury dining spots was this: There's no question of getting unfashionable goulash at...
Feb 24 '09
Closing Time (II): Our Eerily Prescient Warning About a Catastrophic Fusion Meltdown
Now that this site is a couple of years old, it's fun to look back to see how our predictions have panned out. Back in August 2007, when we saw that a restaurant called "Fusion" was about to be...
Feb 24 '09
Closing Time (I): Lou-Lou Aimed for the Michelin Stars, Fell to Earth
Last March I wrote a piece entitled "For Now, Lou-Lou (and Hungary) Will Have to Settle for the Top 33" about how a high-end Budapest restaurant that had been openly pining for a Michelin "star" would have to console...
Feb 10 '09
A Pair of Valentine's Day Specials We Could Learn to Love
Unlike in the past, this year we're not going to go out of our way to provide loving coverage to all the restaurants in town offering special menus and extras for Valentine's Day, for the simple reason that we generally...
Feb 06 '09
Mangalica Mania (II): Champagne, Caviar and Pig Grease
Speaking of Mangalica mania, I recently sampled a very interesting product made from Hungary's favorite "luxury" pig. The jar of "pumpkin seed Mangalica fat with truffles" you see nearby is made by a firm called Aranyszarvas-Gomba Kft (Golden Stag...
Dec 22 '08
The Babel About Budapest (II): Blog Blab Mixed on Babel Delikát
Regular readers may have noticed a flurry of recent comments on this site from folks who claim I and my co-authors don't know anything about food, and are thus unqualified to review restaurants. (You can "enjoy" some of the...
Dec 12 '08
Luxury, Lost
Usually I like to end the week here with something nice for readers to chew over. But unfortunately today is not one of those days, as I have the distinct displeasure of reporting that longtime Chew "Top 33" member...
Nov 06 '08
Near Miss in Int'l Design Battle May Re-Ignite Tom-George "Clone Wars"
Via ingatlanmenedzser.hu we hear that the king of Budapest's high-design "eat and be seen" dining scene - Tom-George - recently made the semi-finals in a prestigious international competition in Barcelona. Unfortunately, the challenge in the Catalonian capital wasn't a...
Oct 20 '08
No Real Reason to Say No to Kyoto
Regular readers will notice that this site has of late been pretty bereft of proper restaurant reviews. There are a few reasons for this, but the biggest is that the chief editor - that would be me - has...
Oct 07 '08
Páva Fluffs Up Its Fall Feathers
The last time we checked in with long-time "Top 33" A-lister Páva (follow link for contact details and user feedback), our writer enjoyed her free PR lunch at the "Peacock" so much she said she would have gladly paid...
Sep 19 '08
Culinaris Opens Third Gourmet Store; Putting Final Touches on "Second Fastest" Restaurant in Budapest
Anyone who knows anything much about fancy food in Budapest will already know about Culinaris (click link for contact details and user feedback), the locally-owned chain of gourmet food stores that began with humble roots in District VI before...
Jul 29 '08
Closing Time: Third Time No Charm for Papageno
We'll close out our most recent round of eatery obituaries with what must be one of the saddest and strangest restaurant deaths we've ever witnessed, either in Budapest or anywhere else. It's sad because, at one point in its...
Jul 10 '08
An Expensive PR Lunch I'd Actually Pay For
I generally avoid attending events held for the press for the sole purpose of having nice articles published - not only because they are manufactured, but also because they tend to be boring. I’d much rather eat with my...
Jul 08 '08
Budapest Burgerwar: The Inter-Continental Corso Burger
As I recently explained, our desire to bring the now almost year-old Budapest Burgerwar™ to its long-overdue conclusion has meant putting aside all the "lizard meat" burgers and other burgers of indeterminate animal origin now widely available in Budapest...
Apr 25 '08
Prices Not Only Thing High at Budapest's Latest Gimmick Restaurant
Not already burned out on Budapest restaurants where the prices are sky-high and the food plays third fiddle to high design and high concept? Good news, because I've just found a recently-opened eatery that elevates the local form-over-function and...
Mar 27 '08
I Hear the Gypsy Band at Rézkakas is Great. It Better Be.
After a few years of observant eating at traditional Hungarian restaurants in Budapest, it's hard not to come to a few basic conclusions/rules. Among them are 1) when it comes to value for money, you almost always do better...
Mar 14 '08
For Now, Lou-Lou (and Hungary) Will Have to Settle for the Top 33
Because this publication follows the rather quaint (at least in Hungary) policy of not taking free meals from restaurants - or any sort of compensation/bribes - when doing reviews, we try to make sure that whenever we splash out...
Mar 06 '08
Sins of Gluttonous Thursday (II): Usurious Wine List Makes MO a No-Go
As long as we are on the topic of unhappy experiences during last month's Torkos Csütörtök 50% off restaurant promotion day, we might as well tell our own sad "Gluttonous Thursday" story. Before going any further, let us first...
Feb 25 '08
It's "Häagen Daze and Confusion" as Luxury Ice Cream Hits the Hungarian Food Court
The week before last we said we'd be happier going out to the mall than some fancy restaurant for Valentine's Day, especially if the last course was served at Hungary's first-ever dedicated Häagen-Dazs ice cream parlor, over at the...
Nov 07 '07
Budapest Burgerwar: The Gresham Beef Burger
Having reviewed the Ft 4,250/€16.50 Kempinski Beef Burger back in August, we have by now fully digested the somewhat sickening idea that you can pay as much in Budapest for a hamburger as it might cost to take out...
Oct 24 '07
A Bittersweet Reminder of Would-Be Hungarian Gourmands' Purchasing Power
While waiting for our morning metro the other day at a station in downtown Budapest we spotted this billboard on the other side of the tracks. If your Hungarian is poor enough that you can't tell what it is,...
Sep 25 '07
Russians Implicated in Illegal Sale of Caviar, Real and Fake
The National Investigation Office (NNI) seized and destroyed beluga caviar with an estimated value of Ft 3 billion in Budapest last week, according to nepszava.hu. The beluga sturgeon (Huso huso), source of the premium caviar, is an endangered species,...
Aug 23 '07
Budapest Burgerwar: The Kempinski Beef Burger
We never said the Budapest Burgerwar™ would be easy, and boy is it not. In addition to having to wrestle with all these burgers, we've faced certain troubling philosophical questions, such as whether to include burger chains among our...
Aug 21 '07
Segal Walks Away
The good news is that our recent decision to open up a "recently-closed" tag for stories about restaurants that have thrown in the towel seems to have been prescient. The bad news is that we are now attaching it...
Jul 12 '07
Desk Test: A Perfect Indian Dinner Date, Without the Dinner or Date
The Delivery: Tandoori Plate for two (Ft 5,280) From: Taj Mahal Indian Restaurant, via Netpincér.hu The Lowdown: It's been a long while since we've done a proper test of food eaten at our desk, as for the last few...
Mar 14 '07
Óceán Releases Tuna-Serrano Ham Roll-Ups to Treasure-Hunting Cooks
If there's one thing most high-end restaurateurs really fear, it's the idea that their clients may figure out how to reproduce items from their menu at home. So kudos to the folks over at Óceán Bár and Grill for...
Feb 14 '07
Last Call for Food-Lover-Lovers' Big Night
With just hours remaining until the big event, we have a pair of late additions to Monday's rundown of Valentin Nap specials being offered by some of our 33 favorite restaurants in Budapest. Maybe we're just in the mood, but...
Feb 09 '07
Gourmet Food in Budapest Now Officially *Really* Generic
A few months back, we observed that the opening of a gourmet food store in Pest's District VI called merely the "Gourmet Deli" showed how generic imported or otherwise exotic food had become in Budapest. Well, it seems that...
Feb 05 '07
Inside the Insane World of the Gresham Kávéház's Ft 1,900 Espresso
When we last checked in on Budapest's super-luxury coffee scene, our correspondent was bemoaning the demise of the Ft 800 latte "bargain" at the Four Seasons. Well, it turns out that even a Ft 1,500 latte served in the...
Jan 11 '07
Pork Story (II): Charities Receive Gift of Luxury Pork Fat
Here's one that definitely gets filed under "only in Hungary." Yesterday afternoon, some producers of Hungary's famous Mangalica pigs gave away some 1.5 tons of rendered Mangalica fat worth approximately Ft 1.5 million (€5,800) to 54 grateful educational and social...
Nov 27 '06
There is Simply No Way Segal Doesn't Make the Top 33
It's been more than a month since we scoped out Segal, which recently opened in the former District V digs of culinary wonderland Baraka (Note: See updates appended below). Unlike the normal laziness that leaves us sitting on reviews...
Oct 13 '06
In Search Of Lemon Refreshment
Sickly and aggressive Coca-Cola products have squeezed most other soft drinks out of the market and mixed drinks are normally the reserve of cocktailistas, but sometimes nothing beats a refreshing glass of home-made lemonade. And if you are at home,...
Sep 26 '06
Endangered Sturgeons Grateful for Hungarians' Thrift and Naïveté
We may love veal and goose liver, but just for the record there are some limits to our food-oriented political incorrectness. Case in point is a recent article in Hungarian magazine Deluxe more or less mourning the lack of...
Sep 20 '06
Affordable Lobster Luxuries (II): Risotto at Páva
As we've just said, it's hard to find a good lobster in Hungary, and even harder to be sure that what they say is "lobster" isn't just some old rák. No such problems at Páva, where we recently dug...
