Serious Eats
Langos, Deep Fried Flatbread and Hungary's 'Common Currency of Taste'
One moment, I didn't know anything about Hungarian cuisine; the next moment, all I could think about was lángos (pronounced LAHN-gosh), deep fried Hungarian flatbread commonly rubbed with garlic and topped with sour cream. Food blogger James Boo of The Eaten Path, who recently visited Budapest, describes this savory yeast doughnut as "the common currency of taste," what pizza is to New York City and hot dogs are to Chicago. The lángos in the photo was deep fried in lard and topped with sour cream and sauerkraut. Boo's description says,
The resulting behemoth of fats and flavors was admittedly not as delicious as the fresh, everyday Lángos from the roadside stand; nevertheless, it was a behemoth. The edges were crunchier, the innards were chewier, the greasy taste of the dough was heartier, and the tart, peppery combination of sauerkraut and sour cream cut through the bready heaviness of the Lángos so well that, before I knew it, I had eaten enough to feed a pre-medieval Magyar tribe.
Crunchy, chewy, bready. greasy, tart, and sour? I'm in.
Hungarian food blog chew.hu has some suggestions on where to get the best lángos in Budapest. And if you're not going to Budapest anytime soon, maybe you can try to make it at home. (If someone well versed in the ways of lángos-making has a recipe recommendation, let us know!)