To be honest, we weren't expecting that much from Hungarian cuisine, and sadly on the whole we weren't disappointed. During a 6-day stay we were often left with a heavy, ponderous and slightly queasy feeling as if we'd just been given some bad news, having consumed what we took to be typical dishes (stews, side orders of pasta, lots of meat and few vegetables). Tellingly, this also sums up the facial expressions of many of our fellow diners at a number of eateries.

Lucky breaks came at two main venues: one being the grill houses set up at the open-air wine festival between Deak Ter and Astoria (duck leg, crispy red cabbage, mixed veg), but most significantly (and reliably, as the wine fest isn't an ongoing feature) the fine restaurant Cafe Kor on Sas Utca. We found the place on our penultimate day and had lunch and dinner in there - two meals at one place in a day is something of a first for us.

The restaurant is billed as offering “quintessential Hungarian dishes with an international twist” and this seems to sum it up nicely. The food we had was uniformly excellent, well-presented but not fussy, substantial where necessary but not overbearing - various salads, freshly- and lightly-cooked vegetables, creamy sauces that weren't cloying and drowning the meat or fish. Service was great too - friendly, attentive and relaxed. (We were juggling space on our table at lunch and they offered us somewhere else to sit before it had even crossed our minds to suggest it).

It's quite pricey by local standards, at least compared with the 1000-2000 HUF prices we'd been paying for mains elsewhere, but still very good value. (The wine ramped up the cost of dinner quite a bit, but it still came to about £45 for two - a shared starter, two mains, desert, wine and coffee. Lunch - two salads and asparagus, plus a couple of glasses of wine - was about £18).

It was very busy at lunch and dinner midweek, and they recommend booking. I'm sure there must be many other sources for great Hungarian food, but do check this place out.

Pest V, Sas utca 17;
tel: 311 0053

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