Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
New York Café
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My Cafe, My Castle
Cafe life has a long and colourful history in Budapest. The Turks introduced what the
Magyars nicknamed
fekete leves
(black soup) to Hungary in the early 16th century, and
the coffee house was an essential part of the social scene here long before it had even
made an appearance in, say, Vienna or Paris. In the final decades of the Austro-Hun-
garian Empire, Budapest counted 600 cafes.
Budapest cafes of the 19th century were a lot more than just places to drink coffee.
They embodied the progressive ideal that people of all classes could mingle under one
roof, and acted as an incubator for Magyar culture and politics. Combining the neigh-
bourliness of a local pub, the bonhomie of a gentlemen's club and the intellectual activ-
ity of an open university, coffee houses were places to relax, gamble, work, network,
