Cseri Miklós (szerk.): A Resti. Skanzen füzetek 5. (Szentendre, Szabadtéri Néprajzi Múzeum, 2011)

Pubs in the Middle Ages had publican's licence for selling wine and were not entitled to serve food. The law passed in 1884 allowed them to offer snack meals and one-course meals. The roadside inns (csárda) provided one or two modest guest-rooms in the first half of the 19th century and they sold drinks and cooked food. The csárda building was quite complex in this time: it consisted of a bar with a railed-off counter, a cellar, a guest-room, the living quarters of the inn-keeper, and a shed for horse-carriages with stable belonged to the building. At the beginning of the 1800s many inns opened up in Hungary. Ferenc Scham, a recorder of the events in the town of Pest wrote about the inns in Pest in those days: "In the tap houses all kinds of food is catered too. Snacks and cooked dishes could be chosen from the menu on the table. Many wine-houses served beer too. Furthermore, 31 beer-houses operated in Pest, run by two local breweries, on their own account." One café opened up after the other in Pest and Buda at the end of the 18th century. Guests could enjoy - beside the hot black coffee - other beverages and fine dishes too. Different games entertained the guests: billiard, chess, playing cards and domino. The 'reform era' was an important period in the history of cafés: Pest developed into an economic and spiritual centre of Hungary in this time. The coffee-room became a place of the daily social life, where all those could meet who had the same interest, the same occupation and the same political views. Groups of regulars occupied their usual tables. Parallel with the railway constructions and the shaping of new travelling habits, the entertaining too underwent changes. As the railway transformed the picture of a town or village, the same way the location of the establishments for catering changed too. Hotels, restaurants, pubs were created near the stations. 11