Pogácsa – savory Hungarian biscuits in miniature

At my office in Hungary, you couldn’t have a meeting without pogácsa. Pogi, as they are affectionately known, are sort of the bagels of Budapest; if you organized a coffee break, you’d better provide pogácsa! There are about as many different ways of making pogi as there are bakeries, and everyone has an opinion about […]

Vanilla Crescent Cookies – Vanilkové rohlíčky

Here is the promised third Czech Christmas Cookie. You can find a similar recipe in the December issue of Sauveur magazine, although they call it an Austrian cookie, which raised my blood pressure. Luckily there are bloggers out there who will correct these mistakes.

Star Cookies – Hviezdičky

[vc_video link=’https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrbABpdNO8s’] This is our second Christmas Cookie recipe. My dad’s favorite: the buttery, delicious, and very delicate “stars”. They melt on your tongue. You could make them in any shape, but stars are our tradition, with a window for the jam to peek out from between the layers. Katy was surprised that all these […]

Bear Paws – Czech Christmas Cookie Recipe

Bear Paws - Medvedi Tlapky

There are a few differences between the Christmas season in Central Europe and how most families celebrate in the USA. The major one would be that the presents are brought by the baby Jesus, and not by Santa.  During the dark Orwellian times, the fashion from the Soviet Union was to bring in “Ded Maroz” […]

Dining for all five senses

Senses are the most important connections to our culture, to the place where we were born, grew up and plan to rest. The sights, smells, smiles, gestures, sounds. Yes, yes and flavors, of course. I think it is true for all Central European nations, but speaking for Hungarians, the most amazing moments since we moved […]