The ancient Hungarian city of Pécs feels like an unlikely spot for Morzsa. On an elegant peach and cream street, in the shadow of Roman and Ottoman landmarks, this new wave bakery-cum-bistro serves up a highly cosmopolitan experience that thoughtfully balances avant garde tastes with popular demand and affordability.
Morzsa – which translates into ‘Crumbs’ – was awarded a Michelin Bib Gourmand this Guide year, highlighting it as an establishment that offers high-quality cuisine at a reasonable price. It achieves this through a unique service proposition: an in-house artisanal bakery serving viennoiserie at “democratic” prices, an all-day small plates offering, and a tasting menu in the evening. That's not to mention a comprehensive drinks list, which ranges from classic wines to experimental sakes.
The Morzsa Philosophy
Morzsa’s philosophy is born out of 15 years spent deep in the trenches of Budapest’s dining scene at a transformative time for food in the capital, as well as its three co-creators’ wealth of knowledge of, and fierce passion for, pioneering gastronomy. Travel also plays a vital role.“The three of us [owners Zoltán and Lili and chef Attila], we have an extremely deep and broad experience and knowledge of gastronomy, we have been literally everywhere, read everything,” says Zoltán Benkő, Morzsa’s Maître d' and Sommelier. “Above this, we have a special and very definite taste, concerning food, drinks, style and ambience. And this is very avant garde and absolutely not mainstream – especially for Pécs.” Indeed, the inspiration behind Morzsa is wide-ranging, drawn from the Danish and Swedish gastro scenes, Middle Eastern cuisine, Japan’s shokunin philosophy, and restaurants in Berlin, Paris and Jerusalem (Ernst, Septime and Machneyuda, respectively).
Morzsa’s challenge, Zoltán says, is remaining faithful to the trio’s vision, whilst taming it enough to achieve popularity and survive. However, selling out is not on the cards. “We will never do anything we don't like to become more popular or make more money. No compromise. Never.”
Owners Zoltán Benkő and Lili Tomin
Morzsa’s Origin Story
In the 1990s, Zoltán Benkő was working in finance. But he’d been passionate about gastronomy from a young age, and in the mid-‘90s he travelled the world, indulging in culinary experiences.2010 would be a pivotal year for Zoltán. He founded his first restaurant in Budapest – the easy-going, artsy Mák – and met future Morzsa co-founder Attila Kurucz, a “talented young chef in those times”. Attila credits Mák for giving him a “new perspective” on cooking, remembering the restaurant as “very different from everything we had at that time”. When Zoltán opened Mák in 2010, “that was a revolution in the Budapest gastronomy scene,” he says.
In the following decade, Zoltán and Attila were incredibly active in Budapest. In 2011 they opened Lacikonyha – “a spontaneous, underground, but still very refined bistro”. That same year, Zoltán launched wine bar and bistro Innio, and quickly hired Attila as the chef. Attila experimented heavily in Innio’s kitchen, a “super exciting laboratory”.
Meanwhile, Lili Tomin, Zoltán’s wife, was busy baking. An art philosophy grad with a childhood love of baking, Lili decided to lean into her passion after her croissant won first place at the Kenyérlelke baking festival, beating professional rivals. In 2017, she founded artisan bakery NOR\MA in Budapest.
‘The Big Throw’
After a long shift on the Budapest gastronomy scene, in 2019 Zoltán and Lili were ready for a change of pace. They closed Innio and sold NOR\MA, and moved their family to Pécs, a 2.5-hour drive from the capital, for a more relaxed ‘countryside’ life. Zoltán announced his retirement from hospitality. Evidently, this did not stick. “As time flew, I started to miss the restaurant life – taking care of guests, creating day by day,” he says. “Me and my wife Lili were dreaming a lot about 'finally' making something together.”Slowly a plan came together. They would open two restaurants: a refined boutique restaurant that would be their flagship and allow them to showcase the vision they had built during their decades in gastronomy, and something “more popular and easier” – a bakery-cum-bistro. Zoltán would be the maître d' and sommelier, Lili the head baker and pastry chef. And when the couple asked Attila to helm the kitchen, he immediately moved his family to Pécs. “Now I feel that we are experienced and mature enough for the big throw,” Attila says. “To create something that can be the essence of it all.”
The flagship is still in the works, but Morzsa, which launched in 2021, has landed somewhere between the two initial concepts. For customers, the combination of crowd-pleasing classics and more avant garde dishes is evident.
Chef Attila Kurucz
Dining at Morzsa
Arrive at Morzsa on a sunny morning and you can sit outside on the part-pedestrianised lane (a great people-watching spot) with a mug of specialist coffee from Copenhagen’s Coffee Collective – “good old friends of ours who make the best coffee in the region”. Or head to the interior, tiled in azure and lined with small wooden tables, to watch Lili bake while you indulge in a breakfast menu with dishes including scrambled egg with cabbage and sesame, homemade brunost cheese, and az a túrógombóc ('that cottage cheese dumpling') – one of the restaurant’s signature dishes.Meanwhile, Lili’s bakery produces sourdough bread and viennoiserie made with organic, local flours. On the side, you can choose from a selection of Normandy butter, Maldon salt, Persian pistachio, artisan cheese and ham, and backyard fruit and vegetables. The lemon meringue cruffin comes highly recommended.
The “all-day gastro experience” continues with a modern small plates concept – progressive, eye-catching bistro cuisine with Attila’s signature interpretation. But it’s dinner – the tasting menu – that excites Attila and Zoltán the most. After all, this is where Morzsa’s philosophy really shines through, and they relish the chance to connect with customers over shared gastronomical passions. “Dinner is much more personal,” Zoltán says. “We stay with the guests for at least two hours. We can talk, we can build a connection, sometimes friendship. And we can show them what we love to cook, eat, drink. We make people happy with something that comes deeply from us.”
On Morzsa’s ever-changing tasting menu, you’ll find flavour-packed dishes such as duck breast with pumpkin and sloe, fennel seed mangalitsa pork sausage, and cardamom with apple and walnut. The tasting menu rotates around 100 well-developed recipes Attila has collected and refined over the past 15 years. But the kitchen is constantly innovating with new flavours and ingredients too, taking inspiration from all over the world, with plant-based cuisine increasingly coming to the fore. The chef recommends túrós palacsinta for dessert – a cottage cheese crepe beloved by Hungarian families. Inspired by Mák’s elevated version of this traditional dessert, as well as Agi's Counter, an Eastern European restaurant in Brooklyn, New York, Attila created his own version.
As a small restaurant serving a small market, Attila says the ever-changing menu – which always incorporates a signature dish as well as a fresh new recipe – is key to retaining the interest of regulars. How does the kitchen choose which dishes to select? It’s by season, market supply or mood. “But this is more spontaneous, more instinctive than conscious,” Attila explains. “It is quite often when myself or Zoltán are ourselves missing a flavour or a dish that we’ll schedule it for upcoming weeks."
Supplying the Kitchen
Attila’s favourite Morzsa dishes take advantage of Pécs’ verdant surroundings. “I love wild forest mushrooms very much, especially when foraged personally,” the chef says. “This region is very rich in mushrooms, so we use them as often as possible”.Indeed, while Morzsa works with big suppliers to source international goods such as sea fish, Normandy butter and Asian ingredients, sourcing locally is very important to its founders. Milk, eggs, vegetables and fruits come from local producers – sometimes from backyard orchards. And twice per week, staff from Morzsa head to the market to buy directly from farmers and other small suppliers.
The owners are founding members of culinary development NGO Magyar Gasztronómiai Egyesület, which awards the best local ingredients and producers an aranyszalag (golden ribbon) certification. Morzsa now works directly with many of these producers, and when special ingredients such as ‘golden ribbon’ produce is used in a dish, Zoltán often takes the time to share its story with customers. “These stories are not big stories, but make Morzsa more personal and exciting, and help us to get closer to guests,” he explains.
Drinking at Morzsa
“There is also a story, a joke – when I have wine discussions with guests, sometimes I refer to it as the ultimate argument for my experience – I’ve tasted and drunk at least 5-6 different wines every day for 30 years.”Zoltán, as the restaurant’s maître d’ and resident sommelier, is responsible for the expansive and experimental wine list, as well as developing perfect pairings. “We never choose wines according to origin, but for the style, weather, dishes or personal mood,” he explains. I started with classic, conventional wine and slowly, step-by-step switched to natural wine over the last five-to-six years. I have many more adventures in the natural field – it’s more unpredictable, wider, funkier, and the unusual flavour profiles bring me a lot of fun.”
Morzsa’s wine list is 80% natural, with these bottles coming directly from small winemakers in Hungary, Austria, Germany and France – most of them friends of the owners. The remainder of the vintages are classic big names.
Zoltán’s personal passion for rice-based drinks is evident on the menu too, which incorporates “interesting examples” of saké and takju (a thick Korean rice wine). In terms of beer, there are spontaneously fermented wild ales, lambic, gueuze and sours from Belgium, France and the Nordic region. Lili makes many of Morzsa’s soft drinks using fermentation methods, including kombucha and water kefir.
The Personal Touch
Guests can expect a very warm welcome at Morzsa, with the owners emphasising that the personal touch is an integral part of the experience. “Most importantly, Morzsa is very personal,” Zoltán says. “We are always here – Attila was not away for a single day over the past three years. This is the key! The product must be perfect always!”Zoltán loves talking to customers about food, which has led to many following him from one establishment to another over the years. In fact, some of his old regulars have made the 2.5-hour drive from Budapest to experience Morzsa. “We always try to do our best to make guests feel comfortable and ensure they enjoy their time spent here as much as possible,” he says.
Where to Stay
If you wish to experience Morzsa and explore the historic city of Pécs, The Michelin Guide Inspectors recommend the stylish Palatinus Boutique Hotel. Housed in an elegant 18th-century building, the 29-room hotel is close to Pécs Cathedral and the Zsolnay Cultural Quarter – and well-situated for the bars and restaurants of the city’s downtown district. Inside, the décor is modernist, with bold colours, dark woods and stone-clad bathrooms, while historical photos on the walls nod to the city’s storied past.
© Palatinus Boutique Hotel
All Restaurant Photos © Milan Radisics
This post is brought to you in partnership with Visit Hungary
