Best of Budapest & Hungary

Last year had the largest number of trains in Hungary running with on-board restaurants and bistro cars, and the passenger catering service was used by almost one million passengers, Hungarian State Railways MÁV said in a statement on Sunday.

    More than a hundred coaches with dining or premium and bistro compartments run daily on international and domestic services in the country.

    In the domestically produced IC+ premium and bistro coaches with premium and bistro compartments, which are connected to domestic ICs connecting Budapest with the big cities in the countryside, such as Debrecen, Miskolc, Pécs and Szeged, the passenger catering service typically offers cold drinks, simple meals, sweets and coffee, while the dining cars have a restaurant-style standard and offer, the company said.

    Last year, 22,000 burgers were sold, almost 10,000 portions of goulash soup, 4,000 portions of beef stew and 5,800 portions of chicken paprikash were served, more than 280,000 pints of beer were served and almost 70,000 chocolate rolls were sold, the transport company said.

    According to the statement, the passenger service on trains to and from Lake Balaton and international lines was also popular during the tourist season.

    In the summer, almost 45,000 transactions were made on the dining cars of the Balaton InterCity trains between the capital and Keszthely, and more than 21,000 on the bistro cars of the Blue Wave IC trains.

    On the Adria IC coaches between Budapest and Split, 4,000 people bought food or drinks, with burgers being the most popular and almost 6,500 pints of beer consumed.

    The predecessor of today's Passenger Catering Organization, the National Passenger Catering Company, was established 76 years ago, in November 1948; since 2020, the renewed Passenger Catering Directorate has more than 400 staff members dedicated to planning, organizing and implementing the day-to-day running of rail catering services, the railway company said.