Hungary for more
Trim, bright-eyed and massively moustachioed, Kalman Kalla looks as though he might have stepped out of a Tintin adventure set in Transylvania. In fact, the executive chef of Gundel's, Budapest's top restaurant, manages a brigade of 50 chefs in a restaurant that opened its doors 102 years ago.
The name Gundel is as famous in Hungary as Ritz is in the rest of Europe. Great-great-grandfather Janos opened a restaurant in the Istvan Foherceg hotel in 1867 and his son Karoly founded the present Gundel's, owned by George Lang, proprietor of New York's Café des Artistes and an authority on Hungarian food.
In scale, it is similar to London's Café Royal. The restaurant, eight function rooms and two wine cellars, set in the City Park of Pest, can seat 1,000 guests. For banqueting, it may serve 800 portions of its borjúszüzzel töltött szarvas - roast venison in a sesame seed crust stuffed with veal fillet (see recipe) - at a sitting.
In the rest of Europe, knowledge of Hungarian food doesn't usually stretch much beyond goulash, paprika, salami or strudel. But Hungary does boast a rich tradition of domestic cooking and, in Budapest at least, of sophisticated dining. Under communism the restaurant scene stagnated, but since the end of that era there has been something of a revival, even if menus do still tend to be a bit time-lagged.
Gundel's reputation has always been linked to its specialities. Many - the goose liver with Tokay jelly, zander fillet in a cream sauce, walnut-stuffed pancakes or wild mushroom stew - date from the early part of the century. According to Kalla, the original versions would be heavy for modern tastes and he has tried to give them a lighter touch. Even so, a strong classic imprint remains and the French influence is never far away.
His recipe for fogas Gundel módra - zander with a cream sauce - typifies the changes he has made. Karóly Gundel's early version comprised a breaded fish fillet on spinach purée and a mornay sauce with piped duchesse potatoes. The current recipe suppresses the flour, egg and breadcrumbs, replaces the cheese sauce with a white wine one, the puréed spinach with lightly cooked leaves, and the potato with carrot and courgette balls. ê
When Professor John Fuller published his encyclopaedic book Meat Dishes in the 1980s, he included almost 100 Hungarian recipes, more than three times the space he gave to British ones. If his textbook were to be updated now, the balance would no doubt shift, but it shows the emphasis given to meat and the variety of ways in which it is prepared in Hungarian cuisine. There are as many kinds of goulash as there are cooks in Hungary, and combining veal with venison does not seem odd, because both are abundant in Hungary.
Pancakes may have gone out of fashion in British restaurants, but they remain a favourite in Hungary. Fillings are rich and lavish, including the likes of chopped walnuts, ground almonds, raisins, sour cream or cottage cheese, apple meringue and, very often, rum. In the Gundel crêpe signature dish, palacsinta have a walnut paste filling and a hot chocolate sauce poured over them. The menu includes multi-layered pancakes with almonds, lemon zest, raisins and blueberry preserve, and a crêpe soufflé.
Kalla has worked at his country's Washington embassy and in New York, France and Japan, but the international experience hasn't led him to reject his Magyar roots. He works with local produce in a country endowed with its own foie gras, boletus mushrooms, summer truffles, frogs' legs, crayfish and wild boar, a catalogue of luxurious ingredients that might equally have come from the traditional home of gastronomy, Périgord.
Tokay wine tips
Hungary is famous for its syrupy Tokay wine. The following terms will help you to read the label:
Furmint is the variety of white grape used. Described by oenologists as "fiery", its high acidity level makes it suitable for ageing - 100 years is not unknown.
Aszú describes noble rot caused by Botrytis cinera to the grapes on the vine.
Puttonyos indicates the degree of sweetness and quality of the wine, on a scale of one (lowest) to five (best).
So, for example, a Tokaji aszú 5 puttonyos 1988 Château Messzelato is a top-quality wine similar in style to a Trockenbeerenauslese.
Kalman Kalla suggests serving Tokay with a truffled parfait of goose liver in Tokay jelly.
Source: Caterer & Hotelkeeper magazine, 9 - 15 December 1999
