Enjoying Art Deco and Art Nouveau

Femke had set off Monday morning for shopping and I was fine with that. But first we had to have a cake! So we combined watching beautiful Art Nouveau architecture at the Bedö House with a cake in Café Art Nouveau in the same building.
Then Femke took us to Falk Miksa Street which was full of antique stores with very nice art deco furniture. In the shop Montparnasse we found several beautiful Art Deco bars, but alas, the prices where to high for me.

Our last lunch together in Budapest was a quiet and traditional meal at Restaurant Fülemüle. I had a most delicious Hungarian Ratatouille while Femke went for a good piece of steak. Then Sadly I had to wave Femke off as she had to go back to Amsterdam to work. I was of course already working, and planned to stay another day.

In the afternoon I arranged a small improvised wine tasting at Restaurant Klassz, then met up with my local friend Masha and her boyfriend at the cool bar Szimpla Kert. It is all very Berliny (in a Budapesty way of course) with numerous rooms and bars in a dilapidated building.

Caking and eating our way through Budapest

With Femke around life is good. Our plan for this weekend is to visit as many good cafés, restaurants and thermal baths as possible for my stories. So we started with cakes at Gerbeaud, a fancy and famous traditional café in the city center. A short visit to the central market hall made us hungry so we sneaked out and into the wine restaurant Borbíróság where we enjoyed excellent lunch. Femke had duck (not for the last time this weekend) while I was more modest with a traditional and tasty cabbage and sausage soup.

Now it was past noon, so high time for another café! This time the venerable Café Central where we had Flódni cake with nuts and poppy seeds (me) and walnut&apple cake (Miss F) to the sound of a violinist.

This was all hard work so we just had to soak up a bit in a bath. Enter Rudas thermal bath, built by the Ottomans in the 16th Century. What a beautiful and atmospheric place!

Swimming makes you hungry but luckily we found a table at the excellent wine restaurant (another one...) Klassz. And then waited a night at the Hungarian State Opera watching ballet. I must admit that dance is not really my thing, I prefer Opera in these circumstances, but the building is beautiful and Femke loved it. And it does give you a bit of a James Bond-feeling to walk down the red carpet of the  magnificent staircase with a glass of champagne and a beautiful woman :-)