Kurtoskalacs
SweetNov to Dec
Kürtőskalács suits anyone at a Budapest market who wants a warm sweet to share, and the trade-off is a sticky caramel crust that's hard to eat neatly in gloves. At the Városháza Park market, look for the stall baking it over charcoal.
Where to eat Kurtoskalacs
- Budapest Városháza Park Christmas marketBudapest
The city's market page lists kürtőskalács baked over charcoal to the original recipe.
Kürtőskalács is a strip of sweet yeast dough wound around a tapering spit, rolled in granulated sugar and turned over charcoal while it's basted with butter. The sugar caramelises into a crisp, shiny crust, and the cake comes off as a hollow cone you tear into spirals. Walnut and cinnamon are the classic toppings. The name joins kürtő, a stovepipe, with kalács, a sweet bread, after the steaming chimney shape.
It belongs to the Székely, the Hungarians of Transylvania. English Wikipedia dates the first written record to 1679, in the village of Úzdiszentpéter, now Sânpetru de Câmpie in Romania. The same article gives the first recipe as a 1781 manuscript cookbook in one place and as the 1784 cookbook of Countess Mária Mikes in another, so the date of the first recipe is unsettled. The caramel glaze came later, with the first mention of sugar sprinkled on before baking in an 1876 cookbook from Szeged.
Tourism brought it back to Hungarian cities by the mid-1990s, and makers now sell it across Europe. English Wikipedia says Hungary has taken steps to register it with the EU, and the EU register held no entry for it when we checked on 10 October 2026. Its cousins include the Transylvanian Saxon Baumstriezel, the Slovak Skalický trdelník and the Czech-Moravian trdelník, and those have no caramel glaze.
Worth knowing
- Share one between two; it's a big, sweet cone.
Quick answers about Kurtoskalacs
What is kürtőskalács?
Kürtőskalács is a Hungarian chimney cake from Transylvania: sweet yeast dough wound on a spit, rolled in sugar and baked over charcoal until the sugar caramelises.
Is kürtőskalács the same as trdelník?
They're cousins in the same family of spit cakes. Kürtőskalács is rolled in sugar before baking and gets a caramel glaze, while Slovak and Czech trdelník doesn't.
How do you order Kurtoskalacs?
Ask for one kürtőskalács and pick a topping, most often ground walnut or cinnamon. Tear it off in strips along the spiral while it's hot. Budapest's Városháza Park market advertises one baked over charcoal to the original recipe.
When is Kurtoskalacs in season?
Kurtoskalacs: All year in Hungary, and on Budapest's Christmas markets from mid-November.