Mám rada jidlo!

When my dad arrived in Prague, he commented on how everyone was thin. It’s true, in general - those who do have some extra around the middle are almost never under the age of 35. He then said, “Well, it’s because they have smaller portions and all.” And that is where he was completely wrong, as he soon learned. It’s either an active lifestyle, good genes, or something in the water keeping these people thin, because the portions in Prague are NOT small, and the food is NOT healthy by anyone’s standards.

Czech people loooove to fry things. The Czech word for “fried” is “smaženy“, and it appears approximately 47 times on any given restaurant menu. There is smaženy syr (fried cheese), smaženy vepřove (fried pork), smaženy pstruh (fried trout), smaženy kuřeci (fried chicken)…the list goes on and on. None of these dishes are served with a vegetable, save the “garnish“, which consists of a few slices of cucumber and tomato. You can order a vegetable side dish, but it’s not very popular – you’re more likely to order hranolky (french fries).

The only vegetable that is truly popular is the potato. They serve potato everything here. French fries, potato pancakes, potato dumplings. Again, it goes on and on. At one meal I was served potato soup with potato dumplings and trout. It was extremely tasty, but when you’re washing it all down with beer it’s hard not to think about the fact that the only reason your jeans aren’t feeling tighter is because you can’t dry them in a dryer.

Nonetheless, the food here is quite good. And cheap. I haven’t been able to find a place to get decent-looking burgers yet, but I’m holding out hope. Finally, desserts tend to be amazing. Many of them involve fruit, like hot raspberries with vanilla ice cream, or crepes with peaches and blueberries. The bakery in the metro has a yummy jablkový závin (apple tart) that I sometimes get on my way to class in the morning.

The only thing I’m still searching for is good hamburgers (already mentioned) and good Asian food! I’ve eaten in two Chinese restaurants so far and they ran the scale from so-so to pretty-damn-bad. Luckily there are a few cheap ones mentioned in my Prague guidebook so I’ll be checking those out in the near future.