With only two years after 1956, confidence was not the name of the game in Hungary or for that matter in the Hungarian pavilion in Brussels. That is why every move Janos Rakoczi (1897–1966) made was closely inspected by two “politically reliable” chefs, Jozsef Venesz and Emil Turos.

The Hungarian pavilion was located between the Soviet and US pavilions, close to the Atomium. The raw materials for cooking: goose liver, veal, pike perch, sour cream, cottage cheese etc were transported by air from Budapest. During the world exhibition master chef Endre Papp created pancakes filled with meat stew [hortobagyi husos palacsinta] and Janos Rakoczi invented baked meringue cheese cake [which bears his name ever since: Rakoczi-turos] and a new version of tenderloin steak.

Visitors to the Hungarian pavilion relished on goulash and somloi galuska (layered sponge cake with rum and walnut stuffing, heaped with lashings of cream and chocolate sauce). The Hungarian cuisine was for a time the hottest topic among residents of Brussels.

Hungarian dishes ruled at the Brussels expo. Even Soviet Premier Khrushchev asked for three servings of Paprika chicken. The West – it seemed – was chomping on mutton stew [borjuporkolt] and leavened pickles [kovaszos uborka] and ignored the suppressed revolution and the execution of its leader: Imre Nagy [who was hanged on June 16, 1958].

Some people remembered though. Unknown hands painted the word of “Assassins” on the wall of the Hungarian pavilion but by morning the kitchen boys had removed it.

In sum, professionals chefs trained in the interwar period helped restore the international prestige of the regime of Janos Kadar [who was at the helm of Hungary between 1957 and 1988].

Janos Rakoczi – not Ferenc Rakoczi II, prince of Hungary in the early 18th century – became a cook’s assistant at age 15 and was a pupil of Nándor Kedvessy. In the interwar years Rakoczi worked as a cook and then as a chef in Paris, Berlin and London. Then he went on to the Palota Hotel at Lillafured in north Hungary and Gellert Hotel in Budapest. He belonged to that school of chefs (Jozsef Dobos, Karoly Gundel and Sandor Csaky) that blended Hungarian and French traits of cooking. (Edited version of the Hungarian original.)

Source: Heti Válasz

Translated by Budapest Telegraph