In Spain, there was the bocadillo – a sandwich made of the most solid baguette you will ever encounter, and jamon – a cured (and VERY potent) ham.

And Budapest. Well, I’ve shared with you my chamomile experience. Now I will share my grocery shopping experience with you.

When I’m in a country that I don’t speak the language of, I find going out and about very nerve racking. I remember the first time I ordered McDonalds in broken Quebecquois French (is there any other kind of Quebecquois French?!), I was SO proud of myself. I remember talking to my mum on the phone and telling her, with much enthusiasm, that I understood when the lady asked me what drink I wanted with my “Trio”.

Couscous? Not so much...

And with grocery shopping, it was easy enough to figure out what was what.

Fast forward to Budapest. It’s been difficult. I’m not gonna lie! I mean, Hungarian is so complicated, and has so many alphabet letters, and the sounds are so different – I still can’t get the “gy” letter right.

Anyway, so you can imagine the time that I have trying to figure out what to buy. When I needed breadcrumbs, my boyfriend told me that they are called “prezli” or “panir”.. So off I go to the store. And I don’t see anything with those words on it.. But I do see a package of what I presumed to be breadcrumbs that was labelled “morzsa”. So I brought it, and cooked with it.. So I’m quite sure that it was indeed breadcrumbs. So I was quite happy with myself.

And then there was the couscous. The bloody couscous. I decided to make stuffed peppers with couscous and cheese and other bits and pieces and it was going to be delicious. And I got to the store and realised that I had absolutely no idea what “couscous” was in Hungarian. So I wandered around the pasta and rice section, and then to the breadcrumbs and flour section, and even the condiment section. And then I finally found a tiny bag of what appeared to be couscous. The words on the bag did not look like anything I could recognise, and there didn’t appear to be any cooking instructions. So after picking it up and putting it down about 50 times, I walked away.. but then walked back and repeated the whole process again, I thought, “I don’t care, I’m going to buy it, it looks like bloody couscous, I’ll cook it the same way and hope for the best”.

So I got home, and spent the best part of an hour on Google before figuring out that I had brought millet. Which isn’t just for winged creatures. At which point, my boyfriend came home and informed me that he didn’t think that he liked couscous. Needless to say, he nearly got covered in a bowl full of it. But I cooked the peppers (after finding a millet stuffed peppers recipe) and it was delicious!

So, the moral of the story is… just buy it and hope for the best! And if your boyfriend says that he doesn’t like something, just make him eat it anyway!!

• 200 g / 4 cans of tuna (drained and flaked)
• 200 g mashed potato
• 4 spring onions (chopped)
• 100 g / 1 cup of frozen peas or petit pois (defrosted)
• zest of 1 lemon
• Salt and pepper
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 4 tbsp bread crumbs
• 3 tbsp olive oil

For the Mayonnaise

• 4 tbsp mayonnaise
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• Pinch of red paprika
• Salt and pepper

In a large bowl, mix together the first six ingredients. Slowly add enough egg to bind the mixture together.

Wet your hands, so that the mixture doesn’t stick to you, and shape it into patties – make them roughly the size of your palm and about 1 inch thick. Lightly cover each one with breadcrumbs.

Heat the oil in a frying pan over low-medium heat and cook the tuna-cakes for a few minutes on each side. Be careful when turning them!

In the meantime, mix together the ingredients for the mayonnaise – add salt and pepper to taste.

Serve the hot tuna-cakes with a lemon wedge, the lemon mayonnaise, some green salad and a glass of cold Chardonnay. Bon Appetite!

* You can substitute the tuna for tinned salmon.