What to Eat When You're on the Road (European Edition)

One of the many pleasures of traveling is getting to sample different, occasionally exotic national cuisines. Of course, some places (Italy, France) are more well known for their food than others (England, Germany), and usually for good reason. Nonetheless, even some unlikely places offer fantastic and unexpected options.

Here are some of our favorite national dishes that you should give a nosh while making your way around of Europe:

Goulash
No one would claim that Hungary is a place that should be known for its food. Nonetheless, there are few more satisfying meals on a cold night than a bowl of hearty Hungarian goulash, unsurprisingly the most famous dish to emerge from its landlocked, Magyar-speaking homeland. It’s also deceptively simple: a stew of potatoes and beef, mixed in with a few other ingredients and seasoned with paprika. There are any number of goulash recipes, but all are characterized by the dish’s distinctive red color. If you’ve ever enjoyed a beef stew, goulash is something to put on your menu.

Escargot
France is most famous for its elaborate stews and highly-produced meat dishes, but if one thing really characterizes French cuisine, its the ability to turn the strangest imaginable items into delicious treats. Americans often balk at the idea of eating escargot, as it is famously made from snails. What they often fail to realize is that the snail is really little more than a vessel for transporting garlic and butter to their expectant taste buds. And, once you get past how strange it is to be eating a slug, the chewiness of the snail provides the perfect base for appreciating what it’s been cooked in. So, next time you’re in France, or at a decent French restaurant, we strongly recommend being adventurous and giving escargot a shot.

Mostarda
Like France, Italy is one of the world’s great culinary nations -- in the opinion of this correspondent, probably the single greatest. But one of the country’s greatest inventions, mostarda, is largely unknown. That’s partially due to its regional specificity, coming from just a couple towns in northern Italy, and partially due to the initial strangeness of the dish, which is essentially a spicy candied fruit eaten with cheese. If you like horseradish or wasabi at all, though, mostarda will be right up your alley: simply choose one that’s at a level of spiciness that you like and put it on top of a lump of parmesan, which cuts the sinus-clearing effect of the fruit. It’s quite particular, but once you’ve developed a taste for it, there are few treats that are more delicious.

Bigos
Can you tell that we like stew a lot at Daily Lounge headquarters? Bigos is our favorite Polish dish, a stew of meat and boiled cabbage that sounds like it should be pretty mediocre but has a strange spicy zest that keeps you coming back for more. Like goulash, it’s an ideal dish for cold winter nights by the fire, and it goes particularly well with Polish beers like Lech, Tyskie, or Zywiec. It’s also one of the great dishes for leftovers: according to the Poles, the taste actually gets better as it is reheated. In other words, you make a big pot at the beginning of the week and it takes you through all the dinners that you need until it’s time to make another cauldron. It can be found throughout much of eastern Europe, but it’s most particular to Poland.

[All pics via Flickr. Top - F Delventhal. Bigos - Mike Krzeszak. Mostarda - Sifalcia. Escargot - Dion Hinchcliffe. Goulash - Aloa.]