Guests often ask where they can find something specialm to bring home to family members or friends; Budapest is not really a souvenir sort of town … the real pleasure you take home will be less tangible. But over the years we have come across a range of places that feel uniquely to capture aspects of the city:
Paprika and Foodie stuff: The commercially packaged paprika is not bad, but there is often extraordinary artisanal stuff available much of the year at the farmers’ markets within several of the market halls. The Central Market has a small farmers’ market in the area by its rear exit on Friday and Saturday mornings, but there are far larger ones available every day at the market behind the Mammut Mall and at the one at Lehel tér. Look for deep, rich red in sweet paprika, bright electric orange in hot paprika. If you have both options, choose paprika from Kalocsa over that from Szeged (they can be equally good, but Kalocsa is smaller and more consistent).
For artisanal foods products, check into WAMP as well – WAMP is an every other week design and gastro market held in Erzsebet tér. http://wamp.hu/en Or every Sunday at Szimpla Kert: http://www.szimpla.hu/szimpla-market
Oh, and if you find the nut and dried fruit guy in the Lehel tér market, on the wall to the right there’s a shelf with very large bricks of very intense fruit jelly blocks (apricot, plum, mixed). Get a chunk the size of a brick and pack it well to bring home. English not really spoken here.
A word on foie gras (libamaj in Hungarian). Bringing home a fresh goose liver is forbidden in the USA (but legal in the EU), but is such a bargain (4,000-6,000 Forints/ kilo, roughly 1/7 the cost at butchers in NYC), and is so good (indeed, so much richer and more flavorful than those available in the USA or France), that it’s tempting to take up smuggling. Sadly, bottled, tinned, and potted versions are costly (though inexpensive compared to France) and, more importantly, taste like cat food; pass them by
And here’s a weird foodie souvenir: over the years we have found that the paper that our cheeses and cold cutrs from the central market come wrapped in keep them fresher and less moldy than anything at home. I asked at random whether one of the cheese shopsn in the Central Market would sell me some and brought home 200 sheets at $.02/piece. I use it constantly now and my cheeses keep indefinitely
More from my food obsession: the retro Hungarian soft drink Marka, in its sour cherry flavor, is worth ferreting out in the larger supermarkets and tasting, and if you like it, pack some well in your checked bags. And check out the wonderful bags of throat lozenge called Negroes … in almost any supermarket.
Crafts, Artisinal Gifts and Folk Art: If you are around during the Christmas market or the crafts fair at the Castle District on August 20, you can find all sorts of interesting local crafts there. But most of the rest of the year the relentless kitsch of Vaci utca or even the mezzanine of the Central Market can make it feel as though every souvenir shop has the identical objects at the identical prices, straight from the identical production lines in China. For an alternative, check out the small shop under the eaves as one turns into Semmelweis utca from Kossuth Lajos. All sorts of things from jewelry to clothing to art. An upscale, interesting shop. Just down the street, on Kossuth Lajos (#4) you’ll find Szkita Kezmuvesz Bolt – a tiny shop that specializes in nationalist regalia. Despite my uneasy feeling that this place serves the extreme right wing political party – Jobbik — as the sort of shop where Ku Klux Klansmen bought their white robes, you’ll find all sorts of things here you won’t find anywhere else, from t-shirts to authentic replicas of the medieval tribes gear from boots to bows and arrows. Hungarian website: http://www.szkitabolt.hu
And there’s a marvelous puppet workshop and shop on the corner of Dob and Sip. (Hungarian website, but great photos and a sense of the place.) http://www.manufaktor.hu/manufaktor/manufaktor.html
Perhaps our favorite little kitschgy place is Hollo Workshop, around the corner from the Gerloczy Café on Vitkovics Mihaly utca: http://www.blogger.com/profile/03383127552191913154
Modern Hungarian Design: Again, the design market on Sundays in Vaci utca #1 is a treasure trove of modern artisanal design: http://wamp.hu/en There is a small artisanal design shop as well on Semmelweis utca, with daily hours: Rodendron. Also peek into Medence when you go to the Central Market, a design workshop and store on Pipa utca, the small side street to the left of the Market Hall building as you face it. There’s also a design shop – Hybridart — in the display gallery at Erzsébet tér, and Printa, a silkscreen design shop on Rumbach Sebestyén. And a modest crafts fair on Sundays in Gozsdu Udvar…
Gloves: Some of the finest men’s and ladies’ gloves are crafted in Pecs (that’s where Coach gas theirs tailored). You can find an array of excellent examples of these in a small shop just north Astoria on Karoly Körut. Not cheap, but excellent value and workmanship. Pannon Gloves, Károly krt 4. Website (Hungarian): http://www.pannonpecsikesztyu.hu
Furs: If you know what you are doing, Hungary is a great place to buy furs that are tailored locally. But it really takes a buyer who has the right mix of knowledge and experience to know how to distinguish the quality of the work. Shops on Regiposta utca and around the start of Dob utca would be where I would start …
Ties: Kaczian is a tiny, shop whose owner is an elegant woman who selects the fabrics, designs the ties, and oversees their handmade production. Ties, bowties, cravats, mufflers; wonderfully made not cheap, but priced around the same as mass produced items from comparable fabric in the USA. Kind of a treat just to wander in off the pedestrianized alley between Vaci utca and Petöfi utcs – Régiposta utca 14.
Diaries, journals, and papers: Kaczian is adjacent to an artisanal paper and portfolio shop called Bomo Art Paper, which is also something of a find.
Tablecloths: You can find antique and pseudo-antique lace at the Ecseri Flea Market and at shops on the antique street, Falk Miksa utca, but there is also a kind of contemprarily-woven linen-y fabric that makes wonderful tablecloths, is distinctively Hungarian, and is our favorite style to bring home. You can spot this material in some shops around town, but the best we have found come from a woman whose stall is just to the right as one enters the Ecseri Flea Market, a good ways out of town.
Duvets and pillows: Most of ours come from Peter’s Paplan a pretty rigorously Hungarian-speaking-only manufacturers outlet’s a relatively sketchy part of town … Kálvária square 19. Another, quite wonderful, option that is more central and approachable and English-fluent is Elfenbein at Teréz krt. 35. Elfenbein will make things to order on very short notice and also help with VAT refunds.
Crystal: Ajka Crystal is produced in a small town in Hungary where fine lead crystal has been crafted since the 19th Century. There is a large shop (which often has a well-stocked sale table) on Kossuth Lajos (#10) utca between Varoshaz and Semmelweis.
Custom Men’s Shoes: The guy who wrote the book on the subject is Laszlo Vass, and he has a shop on a small alleyway – Harris Koz — between Vaci utca and Petofi utca. I personally am not a fan – I have not found the sales staff welcoming or helpful and they have been resistant to modifying designs – if you can’t customize a custom-made shoe, what’s the point? Instead, I shop at Istvan Toth’s workshop and store on Vamhaz körut. Toth is more bootmaker than top-of-the-line fancy dress shoemaker, but I like his work a lot, he has been happy to work with me to modify his designs and to copy shoes I especially love, and his prices are a very good value. The next pair of shoes I have made, though, will come from Rozsnyai Shoes– next to Vass on Harris koz (a former orthopedic shoe maker, he and his son have turned their attention to fine footwear with a level of zeal and attentiveness ….).
Oh, and there are retro communist era sneakers available as well, kind of the anti-custoim shoe: Tisza Sneakers very near Astoria: http://www.tiszacipo.hu/en/uzletek/Magyarország/Budapest
Antiques and Flea Markets: There is a great old-style, somewhat tattered (by definition?) flea market at Ecséri, outside of town. Within Budapest there is an Antiques street – Falk Miksa utca… don’t miss the catacomb shop Pinter Antik or the outlet for BAV the national pawnshop chain , which also has furniture and jewelry shops at Szervita tér the jewelry and silver stuff in the shops by Szervita tér are particularly worth looking at if you are interested in relatively reasonably priced high end gifts and souvenirs to take home. Near the Central Market, there is a somewhat lower end antique shop we like on Vamhaz krt (#9) – Klapka. And there are a number of kitschy junk shops – often called Antik Bazaar – one on Dohany just before Sip and another on Klauzál utca just before Rákóczi. And there’s a collection of small antique/junk sellers in an indoor market on Anker köz.
