Breakfast

 

                When the girls were in school in Szulok and started classes early in the morning, they were often served a breakfast of bread and margarine and wieners. I forgot this and didn’t know what to expect when I arrived for student breakfasts. My first meal, I was given a slice of pepper and a bowl of türo (like cream cheese) to go with my bread, and a warm pitcher of sweet tea. I was awed by the towers of bread boys were taking back to the tables with them, 14, 15, 16 slices. The next day, cans of liver spread lined the shelf next to a basket of kifli, or crescent rolls. I was given a pitcher of warm cocoa too. The last breakfast I ate in the student canteen included a plate of pale wieners, a bowl of mustard, and zsemle, a roll. Boys were carefully slicing their hot dogs and making sandwiches for themselves, stacks of them, 6 or 7, some for now and some for later in the day. Maybe I didn’t know much about breakfast in my Hungarian year: in Seattle I eat cereal nearly every day and in Hungary, I ate muesli or corn flakes on the same schedule. Kriszta laid out hot dogs and ketchup and mustard, cheeses and jams and maybe some other things after my night at their house – much more than she usually prepares for just her and Péter – and it was then I remembered the children’s meals. This morning in Vienna, Zsófi filled every available space on the table with breakfast items I might enjoy: Swiss and Havarti cheeses and brie, her sour cherry and cloved strawberry jams, pâté and honey, cured deer meat and Pick salami from Szeged and ham, yoghurt, muesli and more.

Breakfast at Gábor and Kata's

Breakfast and Barna and Zsófi's

Breakfast in the canteen, rolls and deep plate of honey.

And below are some other meals, the top three in the student canteen for lunch, the middle Gundel-style palacsinta with Kata, the bottom two with Zsoka, in the forest (mushrooms and garlic).