Christmas in Hungary

In Hungary the Christmas tree is decorated on Christmas Eve. In addition to the

usual decorations, we also put fondant candies on and under the tree. According to
the Hungarian tradition, the Christmas presents are brought by Baby Jesus on
Christmas Eve. As for Santa Claus, he visits on December 6 bringing sweets and
presents for those well-behaved children who put their clean shoes on
the windowsill the night before.
Typical Hungarian Christmas dishes include: fish soup or bouillon, stuffed cabbage,
roast turkey with stuffing, and the famous poppy seed or walnut rolls.
The poppy seed or walnut roll is a traditional Hungarian pastry, mostly eaten during
the winter holidays. It is basically a sweet bread, known as bejgli in Hungary. During
the last few decades other variants (such as chestnut, plum jam, prune, or even
cocoa) have become popular, too.
Did you know? Poppy is widely consumed in many parts of Central and Eastern
Europe. The sugared, milledmature seeds are eaten with pasta, or they are boiled
with milk and used as filling or topping on various kinds of sweet pastry. In countries
where eating poppy seed is not so common, people think that it can be dangerous or
even lead to a positive drug-test.
Another typically Hungarian Christmas sweet is szaloncukor
(literally: parlour candy), which is a type of sweets, traditionally associated with
Christmas in Hungary. It is usually made of fondant, covered by chocolate
and wrapped in shiny coloured foil. It is often used as decoration on Christmas trees,
hung on with strings or small metal hooks.
Fondant candies originally came in a few flavours (vanilla and strawberry for
example), but now there is a wide variety of different kinds of candies, including jelly,
coconut, hazelnut and lots of other flavours.
As far as Christmas fairs are concerned, among the many Budapest Christmas
markets, one of the most popular ones is held on Vrsmarty Square, in the heart of
the citys 5th district. This traditional Budapest Fair is a great place to get
your unique Christmas presents, as here you can always find some exclusive and
hand-made art products and all kinds of decorations, made with authentic
techniques. While youre looking for the perfect gifts or winter souvenirs, you can
enjoy a variety of programs, listening to folk music, taking part in a Christmas tree
decorating competition or sipping mulled wine and feasting on the traditional
Hungarian dishes and cakes from the open kitchens around the square. If you
havent been to this fair yet, you should try lngos (deep-fried bread dough, usually
topped with garlic, sour cream and cheese) and krts kalcs (hollow, cylinder
shaped pastry, baked over an open fire with ground walnut or other sweet coatings),
but you will have an extra hard time choosing what to eat this time. A novelty in
recent years has been the even wider selection of culinary delights - stuffed
cabbages, grilled meat and fish, strudels and the other Christmas delicacies.

Vocabulary
fondant candy szaloncukor
windowsill ablakprkny
stuffed cabbage tlttt kposzta
stuffing tltelk
poppy seed mk
walnut roll dis tekercs, bejgli
pastry stemny
decade vtized
chestnut gesztenye
prune aszalt szilva
to consume fogyasztani
milled rlt
filling tltelk
topping feltt
parlour szalon
wrapped csomagolt
foil aluflia, fnyes csomagol
flavour z
jelly zsel
Christmas fair karcsonyi vsr
unique klnleges
to sip kortyolgatni
mulled wine forralt bor
to feast on lakmrozni
deep-fried olajban slt
dough nyers tszta
coating mz
novelty jdonsg
strudel rtes