Pancakes in Hungary mean thin dough, jam, cottage cheese or perhaps a little cocoa powder. But almost every nation has its own speciality. With travel out of the question, Around Pancake on Nagymező utca now presents 14 international varieties, to give you a flavour of the outside world.
For Csilla Szőke, Máté Milasovszky-Gálszécsy and Márton Nagy, Around Pancake is not their first joint catering project, but the first put together based on the inspirations of a teenager. Csilla and her daughter fell in love with a confectionery in Rome, where a hundred kinds of tiramisu were offered – inspiring the idea that something similar could be done at home.
Although each type of tiramisu may not have been too authentic, since Csilla’s daughter’s favourite is pancakes, and with almost every nation having its own, they decided to open a pancake shop to showcase the global range based on traditional recipes.
According to the original plans, this would have been a simple street-food place, but professional advice suggested to throw in a little quality, too. This is particularly apparent in the technique. The place is neither fancy nor overpriced, the pancakes arrive on bio-degradable plates and, once we’ll all be able to sit inside, are served in sophisticated fashion.
The space, with its refined shapes and natural colours, echoes loose casual dining or street food. In the middle, a stair-like feature covered with deep green tiles takes the attention away from the standard tables and chairs surrounding it.
The current 14 pancakes on offer should pretty much remain the same. Csilla’s team tried to compile the menu so that everything was in one place: from familiar Hungarian to spongier Scotch pancakes, Russian blini, South-American arepa and savoury Japanese okonomiyaki.
There are several types of meat, fish, vegan, vegan and sweet pancakes on offer: sweet Oriental, puffy French classics, and so on, ideal for a main course, dessert or just a quick bite. Price-wise, too, the range is wide, from a few hundred forints to 2-3,000.
Japanese okonomiyaki (1,890 HUF) feature tuna flakes, sushi ginger, Japanese mayonnaise, okonomiyaki sauce, coriander and salty ham. Not only nourishing but also delicious, they provide what you would expect from Japanese comfort food, both in taste and texture. They are also hearty in size, yet light enough for a casual lunch.
The Malay roti jala is a meshy, savoury pancake that can’t really be filled, but when rolled up, it can be used to tuck in the prawn (2,490 HUF) or chicken curry (1,490 HUF) that come with it. To complement a mildly spicy, silky, coconut milk, classic curry of the Far East, the slightly spongy, neutral Malay pancakes go a long way.
The vegan alternative is provided by the fictitious Lebanese pancake (1,490 HUF), the only one on offer invented here in the kitchen. On a base reminiscent of wholemeal, vegan, savoury American pancakes, humus, dried cherry tomatoes, radish petals, watercress, tabbouleh and whole chicory are responsible for the mysterious Middle-Eastern flavours.
By the way, Dániel Konrád, who works in the kitchen, also worked in the kitchen of the Michelin-starred Costes Downtown. Ingredients are not only carefully composed and presentation is exquisite.
At the sweet end of the scale, Lebanese qatayef (1,390 HUF) is a slightly spongy, yeasty pancake, filled
with the soft ricotta cheese and honey-orange cream with pistachio pieces. It’s
extremely invigorating yet light, very Oriental yet not too sweet – the perfect
choice with coffee or if you need a sugar rush.
The soufflé-like Dutch pannenkoek (1,490 HUF), crowned with
sweet maple syrup and acerbic berries, is a classic slice of happiness.
On the beverage front, overseen by the independent barista expertise of
Enikő Kántor, a Pasco coffee roaster, Mayer cordials and DÉR juices provide the
drinks, with excellent homemade lemonade, too. And the water comes through a
Nordaq filter unit.
There is also a house speciality on the coffee front: Barbe à papa, an Americano topped by candy floss, in which a white cloud of sugar melts nicely and slowly into your hot coffee.
For now, you can only have Around Pancake deliver or pick up in person – though sitting on a bench near the Liszt Music Academy in the spring sunshine is little hardship!
Around Pancake
District VI. Nagymező utca 6
Current opening hours: Daily 11 am-7pm
