Global Inspiration on a Jubilee Menu

The MICHELIN Guide-recommended country retreat celebrates its tenth anniversary with a menu shaped by international journeys and a decade of culinary experience.

Botanica in Dánszentmiklós is celebrating its tenth anniversary with a new menu that represents more than a seasonal change. Inspired by the team’s culinary journeys from Peru and Argentina to Brazil, it brings together ideas encountered in some of the world’s most acclaimed restaurants and expresses them through Botanica’s own distinctive style.

Located less than an hour’s drive from Budapest in the grounds of the former Plósz Castle, Botanica has developed into one of Hungary’s most distinctive rural boutique hotels. Surrounded by mature trees, its 13 individually designed rooms, bathing grove and MICHELIN Guide-recommended restaurant combine the tranquility of the countryside with contemporary gastronomy. Under the direction of Chef Tamás Munk, each course is conceived as a story shaped by ingredients, memories and everyday sensory experiences.

A decade of curiosity
Botanica was founded around the idea that nature, hospitality and gastronomy could form a harmonious whole. Ten years later, curiosity remains one of its guiding principles. During the past year, Chef Tamás Munk and the owners travelled extensively, visiting leading restaurants and meeting the people whose work is helping to shape contemporary international gastronomy.
“Botanica was never built according to a ready-made recipe. Over the past ten years, we have continuously searched for experiences, places and people capable of inspiring us,” owner Kristóf Horváth explains. “We travel, observe, learn and taste, but the objective is never to copy. We want to bring home the approach that makes a place genuinely special,” he adds.
In Peru, visits to Kjolle and Mérito introduced the team to an exceptionally diverse ingredient culture influenced by the plant life of the Amazon region. In Buenos Aires, the celebrated Don Julio demonstrated the importance of close relationships with producers and a carefully considered guest experience. In Brazil, restaurants, including Lasai and Casa do Porco, offered further perspectives on creativity, local ingredients and culinary identity.
The purpose of these journeys was not to collect recipes but to understand how internationally acclaimed restaurants approach ingredients, producers and hospitality. These lessons subsequently found their way into Botanica’s own culinary vocabulary.

International ideas, a Botanica identity
The influence of the journeys can be recognized throughout the anniversary menu, which gives greater prominence to fruit, acidity, fermented elements and adventurous seasoning while remaining grounded in seasonal thinking and high-quality ingredients.

The menu opens with sea bass ceviche in a passion-fruit marinade, refreshed with coriander, chili, red onion and green apple. Salmon is paired with pico de gallo consommé, puffed pumpkin seeds, cucumber and balsamic gel. Asparagus, prepared sous-vide before being finished in butter, is accompanied by smoked eel, fish roe, almond crumble and smoked sabayon
A slow-cooked pork belly, glazed with soy and served with coriander-infused pineapple chutney, Parmesan corn bread and Parmesan foam, demonstrates the menu’s combination of richness, acidity and unexpected contrasts. Dessert continues this approach with a passion-fruit tart featuring olive-oil rice sponge, vanilla yoghurt, meringue and diced fennel.
“Every journey confirms that the most exciting discoveries often begin beyond our familiar boundaries,” Chef Tamás Munk says. “I do not bring home recipes, but ideas, flavors, perspectives and inspiration. The jubilee menu is the expression on the plate of the most important encounters and experiences of the past year,” he highlights.
For Botanica, the tenth anniversary does not represent the conclusion of an era. The new menu celebrates the restaurant’s first decade while opening the next chapter – one still driven by curiosity and the belief that inspiration may originate thousands of kilometers away, but can ultimately find its own home in Dánszentmiklós