Meatless in Budapest

First of all, I'm just a pseudo-vegetarian. I'll eat meat if getting a vegetarian alternative would require any extra communication.

Finding vegetarian food in Budapest restaurants is no problem. Most places have one or two veggie dishes on the list. In places serving Hungarian food the vegetarian alternative seems to be always the same: mushrooms in breadcrumbs. After a couple of times I began to prefer the ethnic restaurants.

The school restaurant

There were always some vegetarian prizes on the Goldman food bingo. The bad news is that if you don't know the language, you'll never know what you'll get. The four different dishes that I found, were: zucchini in breadcrumbs, mushrooms in breadcrumbs, cauliflower in breadcrumbs, and cheese in breadcrumbs. Possibly not so wholesome.

Fast Food

Like everywhere, stay away from McD and the equivalents. The many Turkish gyros kiosks always serve also falafel, i.e. excellent meatballs made of peas. The salatabárs are also a great place to have lunch. The warm dishes contain meat, but the salad buffet alone makes a good and cheap lunch.

Ethnic

• Chinese: there are usually some dishes made of tofu.
• My choice 1: Mexican food. There are at least two Mexican restaurants in Budapest: Iguana and Acapulco. They are not cheap, but have good vegetarian dishes. The Rolling Rock bar was not bad either. The best dinner during my staying I had in the La Bodega in the corner of Wesselényi u. and Akácfa u. (M2 to Blaha, tram 4 or 6 to Wesselényi utca.)
• My choice 2: Govinda, an Indian restaurant on Belgrád rakpart. An excellent menu that changes every time. Probably the other Indian places would be good as well.

Other

The pizzerias always have some vegetarian pizzas and pasta dishes. For hard core vegetarians or vegans the best choice is probably making one's own food oneself. See also what the survival guide has to say about the topic.

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