pork
Feb 15 '10
Hungary Wins Knife-Edge Victory Over Romania in Fourth Annual Pig-Killing Olympics
This opening of the Vancouver Olympics wasn't the only closed-watched international winter sporting event this weekend. Over in the heavily Hungarian (81.75%!) Transylvanian city of Miercurea Ciuc/Csíkszereda, Sunday witnessed the fourth installment of what we assume is the world's most...
Feb 09 '10
Walkin' in a Winter Pork Wonderland
If you're wondering why posting has picked up so dramatically today, the answer is inspiration. On Sunday, I stumbled down to Budapest's City Park to catch the tail end of this year's Mangalica festival. Maybe it was the incredibly...
Oct 13 '09
Usual Hamming Around, Unusual Ham at This Year's Pálinka and Kolbász Festival
So just a quick follow-up to my post last week urging everyone to attend the big Budavári Pálinka- és Kolbászfesztivál, which was, as I promised, exactly as a sausage and fruit brandy festival should be. But while there were...
Feb 06 '09
Mangalica Mania (III): America Goes Hog Wild for High-End Hungarian Pork
With the Mangalica Fesztivál starting today in Budapest, we thought we’d take a look at all of the Mangalica madness happening on the other side of the pond (including some of my own). Having long been a Mangalica fan,...
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...
Jan 28 '09
Treacherous Treats (I): Tesco Offers Mark-ups on Out-of-Date Products
A reader of Index.hu consumer blog Tékozló Homár was more shocked than we were to find that unscrupulous British supermarket giant Tesco was not only relabeling food approaching the end of its shelf life, but also increasing its price...
Sep 10 '08
Monor Seeks Illegal Magyar Meat Capital Distinction
Dodgy wine isn't the only thing being seized these days, and while pig lard doesn't technically count as meat, it is an animal byproduct, and therefore relevant to the piece, not least of which is because vegetarians and even some...
May 23 '08
Grab a Korsó and Fill Your Stomach at the Csaba Beer Festival and Knuckle Parade
The "Csaba Beer Festival and Knuckle Parade" ("Csabai Sörfesztivál és Csülökparádé") held at the Békéscsaba Sports Hall has been a tradition since first being held in 2001. This year's event started on Tuesday and runs through Sunday, and as...
May 14 '08
The Price of Pork Goes Up While Pork Consumption Goes Down
The price of pork is expected to rise as manufacturer's expenses increased and will probably continue to do so, Tamás Éder, chairman of the Meat Association (Hússzövetség), told Hírszerző. At the beginning of the year, purchasers paid Ft 250 (€1)...
Feb 26 '08
Survivors of Miskolc Pig Massacre Meet Untimely End on Highway Near Szeged
You know that horrible story about the person who misses a plane which then goes on to crash, only to get in a fatal car accident on the way home from the airport? Well, never mind, because we have...
Feb 12 '08
Crowds Go Hog Wild at First Mangalica Festival
Hungary has so many food and wine festivals - with celebrations devoted to even the most common foods like onions and garlic - that they can be hit-or-miss. If you're judging purely by crowd size, this past weekend's Mangalica...
Feb 08 '08
Will There be Meter-High American-Style Whipped Hungarian Hog Fat Ice Cream at this Weekend's Budapest Mangalica Festival? Anything's Possible!
Our latest last-minute post about an upcoming food event involves this weekend's first-ever "Budapest Mangalica Festival", a multi-day extravaganza featuring all kinds of activities involving Hungary's most overrated beloved breed of pig. But instead of giving you a longwinded...
Jan 07 '08
Holiday Cheer (II): New Year's No Party for Hungarian Pigs
As seen around noon on December 31, at Budapest's Nagyvásárcsarnok (Central Market Hall). And you thought the end of the long holiday break made you feel gutted......
Dec 06 '07
Mikulás Madness (I): "Early" Christmas Brings Nasty Surprise for Nation's Largest Pig
If you hadn't heard, today is Mikulás-nap - St. Nicolas Day - the day on which Hungarians traditionally exchange gifts, in the process baffling Americans and others who are more accustomed to swapping trinkets in the last week of...
Nov 13 '07
Cash-Strapped Breeder Forced into Pig Handout
György Sári, a pig breeder from Sándorfalva (Csongrád County) known for his generosity, is so low on cash that he was forced to give away live pigs to needy local families this year - instead of donating money to a...
Oct 02 '07
Piercing the Myth of the Hungarian "Superpig"
Among all the various articles of faith followed by Hungarian epicures, perhaps the strongest involves the mangalica, a type of pig bred in Hungary. Not only is the long-haired disznó (above) universally considered in Hungary to be tastier than...
May 10 '07
Brauhaus Needs to Knuckle Under to Contest Crunchy Csülök Crown
When it comes to restaurants, nothing breeds excellence like competition. So we hereby unilaterally declare a battle to the death - or at least a spirited contest - between key Budapest Bavarian rivals Paulaner Brauhaus and the Haxen Király...
Jan 22 '07
Great News! (Unless You Are a Pig)
We can hear the sighs of collective relief from the direction of Hungary's multitude of hagymás vér (blood and onions) fans. According to the country's chief veterinarian, Miklós Sütő, his earlier words praising Romanian lawmakers' decision to control the butchering...
Jan 16 '07
Three Little Disznósajts
When a recipe's ingredients include a full pig's head, 2 hearts, 4 kidneys, 4 tongues, 1 kilo of pig's skin, 0,7 kilos of bacon, 2 ears and a couple of pig's stomachs you can be sure about two things:...
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 08 '06
A Thumping Wine Dinner at Eger's Thummerer Pince
When city-dwellers think of wine, their minds usually turn to store shelves and high mark-up restaurant wine lists. But in Eger, or any of Hungary's 23 winegrowing regions, wine is all about popping in to the local termelő for...
Nov 02 '06
German Winter Combo Onslaught (II): Haxen Király's Double-Knuckle Punch
In addition to heaving plates of sausages, the other essential bone-warming Germanic winter treat to be had in Budapest is knusprige Hachse gegrillt auf Holzkohlenglut, a.k.a. charcoal-grilled crispy pig's knuckle. We say "Germanic" rather than "German" because Hungarians also...
Oct 05 '06
Italian-Hungarian Shocker (I): We Thought That Ham Tasted Familiar
So last week's mondo-Italiano food and wine night apparently featured more than just some good olasz eats and drinks. According to a follow-up on deluxe.hu, figures announced at the event show a dramatic increase in food and wine trade between...
Sep 28 '06
Massive Organic Pig Litter May Put Hungarian Pork into Record Books
Hungarian pork already has a reputation for being uncannily delicious. But now one particular porker at an experimental organic farm in Mernye, Somogy County may put the whole country into the Guinness Book of World Records. According to a...
