The variety of Transcarpathia’s culinary highlights is astonishing - you truly will not find or savour such an international, delicious blend anywhere else in Ukraine! Every tasting of Transcarpathian cuisine - is special, vivid and colourful, for it takes place in ancient cellars and castles, in local shepherds’ huts, taverns or museums. And all this - amid the wondrous nature of the Carpathian mountains, which heal and inspire with their beauty.
Today Transcarpathia has plenty of well-designed and richly programmed culinary tourist routes. It simply could not be otherwise in such a multi-ethnic, hard-working region so rich in nature’s gifts! The local Transcarpathian cookery, Carpathian eco-cheeses, lekvar and fruit liqueurs, fragrant natural wine of various varieties, Transcarpathian coffee - all this can be sampled during the excursions of the Uzhhorod Excursion Bureau. It is the tastings of various Transcarpathian products and dishes that will leave delicious memories of this wondrous region and only strengthen the desire to return here again.
Tasting Transcarpathian cuisine: what exactly is an absolute must to try in Transcarpathia?
Dishes of Hungarian, Slovak and Czech cuisine
Throughout its entire history, Transcarpathia has been part of 22 world states, which significantly shaped the region’s subsequent development. Transcarpathia absorbed into its culinary repertoire the most vivid flavours and aromas of each of these countries, and this gave rise to a distinctive, international Transcarpathian cuisine, with no equal. The greatest mark on the culinary culture and gastronomic traditions of this region was left precisely by Austria-Hungary and Czechoslovakia. To taste the national dishes of these states you need no visa - it is enough to set off on one of the delicious journeys of the Uzhhorod Excursion Bureau.
Feel free to try the Hungarian thick and very hearty soups - goulash, bogrács and Jókai bean soup served in a bread bowl, and halászlé fish soup. You will be amazed by rakott krumpli, meaty pörkölt or paprikás - and for a side dish take tarhonya or lecsó. And Magyar cuisine is best tasted in Berehove - for it is this very town that is called the most Hungarian in Transcarpathia.
You are sure to enjoy Slovak strapačky, karbonátky and Czech dumplings with Szeged goulash. These dishes can be tried in Uzhhorod. No Budapest, Bratislava or Prague can even compare!
Besides the dishes of these cuisines, Transcarpathia also widely features others - Romanian, Moldovan, Jewish, Polish, German, Hutsul and even Roma! The range is incredibly rich - from tokan with bryndza, banosh, kremzlyk, piknytsia, palachinta and machanka to frogs’ legs, which are prepared only in the Perechyn district, near the village of Lumshory.
This unique product is made only in Transcarpathia and only at the renowned cheese dairy in the village of Nyzhnie Selyshche in the Khust district . The dairy - is a project of the villagers themselves together with the European cooperative “Longo Maï”. Only the latest Swiss technologies are used in cheese-making. The milk is sourced from villagers who live near the Valley of Narcissi and feed their cows exclusively on natural fodder. During the excursion to the cheese dairy you will be offered a taste of the organic Carpathian cheeses of three varieties: “Selyskyi”, “Khust” and “Narcissus of the Carpathians”. You may purchase any of them if you wish.
Tasting Transcarpathian cuisine: genuine lekvar
Not far from the town of Vynohradiv, in the village of Botar, lies a unique tasting hall and lekvar museum, the only one of its kind in Ukraine - the “Pan Eko” farmstead. You will not see or taste the like anywhere! Lekvar - is a traditional Transcarpathian fruit butter (or jam). The museum’s exhibits - dozens of varieties of delicious lekvar made from bilberries, wild strawberries, cranberries, plums, strawberries, cherries and even kiwi, mango and melon.
They are all organic and made exclusively from natural products, with no added “chemicals”. The hosts collect lekvar recipes from all over the world and keep in the museum fruit butters from various countries, even from Chile.
Heady Transcarpathian wine
A favourable warm climate, thermal springs, clean air and fertile soil of volcanic origin have proved ideal for winemaking in Transcarpathia. The region’s foremost wine-growing districts today are considered to be Berehove, Mukachevo, Vynohradiv and Uzhhorod. It is here that you will find unique old wine cellars, in which captivating wine tastings of such varieties as “Leánka”, “Rose of Transcarpathia”, “Riesling”, “Muscat”, “Tamianka”, “Isabella”, “Kagor”, “Saperavi”, “Black Doctor”, “Tokaji Furmint” and others are held. With such marvellous, sun-filled drinks, your tasting of Transcarpathian cuisine will be simply perfect!
Colourful tastings of wine await you at the Mukachevo Palanok Castle, Uzhhorod Castle, the Serednie cellars, the “Chardonnay” wine-tasting hall, the ethno-wellness hotel “Ungvarskyi”, the Mykhailo Pidloha ChKO House of Wine in Vynohradiv, and also in the Berehove area - at the “Old Cellar”, the “Beregvidék” House of Wine in the village of Yanoshi, and the wine cellars of the Šoš family in the village of Kidosh.
Fragrant Transcarpathian coffee
Transcarpathians sometimes joke that they drink coffee not in order to wake up, but wake up only so that they can enjoy a cup of delicious coffee in the morning. And not only in the morning - coffee in cosy cafés is drunk here practically throughout the whole day. What is more, a whole cult of coffee-drinking has grown up in Transcarpathia, and the tasting of different coffee varieties - is vivid proof of it. You can savour the entire palette of coffee flavours and aromas during the exclusive excursion “Uzhhorod with the Aroma of Coffee and Mini-Sculptures”. The programme features not only Transcarpathian coffee but also a mini coffee museum, a café-museum, the town’s largest coffee lane, Uzhhorod’s mini-sculptures and the finest cafés of the old town.
Savour the whole tasting palette of Transcarpathia on our excursions to this wondrously delicious region. Tasting Transcarpathian cuisine awaits you!
