There’s a lot of good eats to be had at the good ol’ reliable Eton Centris Sunday Market in Quezon City, but there’s one that’s consistently been attracting long lines.
Meet The Real Hungarian. It’s a stall manned by, well, a Hungarian national selling real Hungarian sausages.
When Laszlo Konkoli was assigned to the Philippines in 2011, he immediately missed food from home. He saw there were already a lot of Hungarian sausages being sold in Metro Manila, but the Budapest native says they’re not quite like what they have back home.
The “Hungarian sausages” Metro Manila gets, Konkoli says, have too much extenders and feature huge pieces of black pepper. So he took it upon himself to introduce Metro Manila to the real Hungarian sausages.
In January 2014, he opened The Real Hungarian kiosk at the Eton Centris Sunday Market where he sells authentic Hungarian sausages.
And what they are, are 12-inch sausages that features finely cut meat.
He sells them for PHP150 each, in a baguette with pickled vegetables, or with mashed potatoes (P180). Occasionally, he would put them in a tomato sauce pasta and sell that too for PHP100 a plate.
Satisified customers are able to replicate the Hungarian goodness at home as Konkoli also sells the sausages frozen in shrink-wrap (PHP150/piece or PHP500/a pack of four).
“You can fry or bake them at home but traditional Hungarian sausages are grilled,” he tells Coconuts Manila, adding these sausages are best enjoyed with a beer.
“The spice should come from paprika powder, and use just a little bit of black pepper,” the 37-year-old Metro Manila resident continues. To stay true to tradition, he uses superior-quality casing as “it captures and preserves the flavors.”
He begins working on them on Saturday afternoon, going to the market to buy meat that is already finely cut. He then starts the process of seasoning, freezing, then mincing them to make 150-160 pieces of sausages.
He pre-bakes them already so when Sunday rolls over, he only needs to reheat them in the sandwich maker.
Since opening shop in 2014, the lines have yet to let up. But while very successful, Konkoli, who works as an accountant in at IT firm, is now seriously considering turning over the business to a group of Hungarian nuns caring for orphans in the Philippines. The proceeds can help their mission, he says.
Now, that makes The Real Hungarian even yummier.
The Real Hungarian. +6319175924316. Facebook
