Hungary Just Named Its Ice Cream of the Year — and You Can Try the Winner in Budapest

A Sweet Competition Worth Knowing About

If you’re visiting Budapest this summer and you have even a passing interest in great food, here’s a delicious detour for you: the winner of Hungary’s most prestigious ice cream competition — the Ice Cream of the Year 2026 — comes from a small artisan gelateria right here in the city. So before you head out to explore the ruin bars and thermal baths, you might want to make a pitstop for a very special scoop.

What Is the Ice Cream of the Year Competition?

Every year, the Hungarian Confectioners’ Guild organizes the Ice Cream of the Year competition, bringing together the country’s most talented artisan ice cream makers to battle it out for the top prize. The 2026 edition took place on June 27 at the Hungarospa Beach in Hajdúszoboszló — a famous spa town in eastern Hungary and home to one of Europe’s largest bathing complexes — making for a fittingly festive setting. This year, 72 ice creams competed across five categories, and when you add in previous years’ award-winning flavors that were also on offer, visitors at the event got to taste around 100 different creations throughout the day. Portions were available to the public for just 600 HUF (about €1.50) per serving — a bargain by any measure.

The competition was judged by multiple juries: a panel of master confectioners, a public audience jury, a professional organizations jury, and — for the very first time this year — a children’s jury, whose favorite flavor received the special Kajla Prize, named after the beloved mascot of the Hungarian Tourism Agency.

The Winning Flavor and Where to Find It in Budapest

The gold medal and the title of Ice Cream of the Year 2026 went to Annamária Molnár, a confectioner at Mikrokosmos Ice Cream Shop in Budapest, for her creation called Soléa. The winning flavor is a creamy coconut sorbet with turmeric-mandarin variegato and a coconut crisp — an elegant, sun-drenched combination that sounds as good as it looks. The name itself evokes warmth and light, and apparently the jury agreed that it delivered on every level.

Molnár Annamária didn’t stop at just one prize. Her shop swept much of the evening’s special awards too: Mikrokosmos also won gold in the new Edible Forest category for a flavor called Wild Berry Turkish Delight, took the professional organizations’ special prize, the Visit Hungary special prize, the Artisan Ice Cream Excellence Award, and — proving she has a way with children too — the kids’ jury’s Kajla Prize for a flavor called The King’s Favorite. It was, by any count, a triumphant day for a Budapest ice cream maker.

Mikrokosmos Ice Cream Shop is located on Bartók Béla Avenue in Budapest, Újbuda District, one of the city’s most charming streets on the Buda side of the river, lined with independent cafés, bookshops, and cultural venues. If you’re exploring the area around Móricz Zsigmond Square or heading toward the Gellért Baths, it’s well worth building a stop into your itinerary.

The Edible Forest: This Year’s Wildest New Category

One of the most talked-about highlights of the 2026 competition was a brand-new category called Edible Forest, which challenged confectioners to create flavors using wild and foraged Hungarian ingredients while also embracing sustainability principles. The results were extraordinary — competitors worked with ingredients like pine buds, acorns, spruce powder, spruce bark, and even ox-eye daisy flowers. It’s the kind of creative boundary-pushing that puts Hungarian artisan ice cream firmly on the map alongside Italy and France.

The gold in the Edible Forest category went to Molnár Annamária’s Wild Berry Turkish Delight, while silver went to Bükki Dawn from the Promenád Café in Balatongyörök on Lake Balaton, and bronze to Berry from Bahama Artisan Ice Cream in Újfehértó.

The Broader Flavor Landscape of Hungarian Ice Cream in 2026

Beyond the forest-inspired creations, the overall competition showcased just how adventurous Hungarian ice cream makers have become. This year’s entries featured ingredients like confited lemon, grilled pineapple, wild strawberry, turmeric mandarin, and balsamic vinegar strawberry. On the spice front, competitors reached for smoked salt, Nepalese timut pepper, rosemary, thyme, balsamic vinegar, kaffir lime leaf, and even summer truffle. Exotic fruits like bergamot, passion fruit, yuzu, calamansi, and mango appeared alongside classic Hungarian favorites like raspberries, apricots, and sour cherries.

The free-from category — covering ice creams without added sugar, gluten, lactose, or milk protein — was won by Bergamot Garden from the Promenád Café in Balatongyörök, showing that dietary-friendly options can be just as sophisticated and flavorful as their traditional counterparts.

Plan Your Visit to Mikrokosmos

If tasting the country’s best ice cream sounds like a perfect addition to your Budapest itinerary, Mikrokosmos Ice Cream Shop on Bartók Béla Avenue is your destination. The shop is easily reachable by tram from the city center, and the surrounding neighborhood — known locally as the Bartók Béla Road cultural corridor — is full of atmosphere and well worth a wander. Pair your Soléa with a stroll along the Danube embankment nearby, and you’ve got yourself a near-perfect Budapest afternoon.