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

Since passengers changing trains stayed for shorter time, dishes from the pan became soon very popular beside ready-to-eat dishes. Railway restaurants contributed to propagate food like the wiener schnitzel (meat fried in breadcrumbs) or the rissole. The price of a huge wiener snitzel with two rolls and a mug of beer was one crown. That was also the price of a return ticket in the third class for a 40 km journey. When speaking about railway restaurants, the zone-dishes have to be treated too. Gábor Ba- ross, Minister of Transport introduced the zone-system, the diminishing tariff system, which inspired the zone-system in the restaurants. The purpose of both was to offer a cheaper possibility and to encourage many passengers to make use of them. Following the zonesystem in the railway, and named after it, the zone-dish was the reduced serving of a restaurant dish; in certain places the idea is kept alive up to now. The zone-dish does not mean a small serving, which means three quarter of a main dish. Zone-dish means the rightful half helping. It was served mainly before noon and between lunch and dinner. In the railway restaurant of Lajos Scheiber in Arad offered fish soup, rabbit spinal, veal stew, kidney and brains, small helpings of caviar, sardines or escargots. The railway restaurants in smaller and bigger towns played a role in the propagation of gastronomic novelties.