During the last full day of our trip to Zagreb in Croatia, we decided to head to Sofra Green Gold- a traditional Bosnian food restaurant. I have never previously had any opportunity to try Bosnian cuisine. It is known to be often prepared with good quality meat that is one of the key ingredients of some of the most popular Bosnian dishes such as bosanski lonac, ćevapi, begova čorba, burek, and grah so it took no time to convince my husband to accompany me to a lunch at this restaurant.

Location:

Sofra Green Gold restaurant is located in a business district of Zagreb, around 20 minutes’ walk or 5 minutes taxi ride from in the city’s centre.

Atmosphere:

The atmosphere at this traditional Bosnian restaurant is homely and it features lots of traditional features. I really enjoyed its décor and, for a minute, it felt like I was taken to a different country.

We were attended by a few different approachable waiters throughout our lunch.

The menu:

Sofra Green Gold restaurant offers traditional Bosnian specialties served in authentic Bosnian environment.

Starters:

To start with, we tried some Begova čorba. It is the most popular soup in Bosnia– Bey’s soup made of chicken meat, vegetables, cream and okra.

Mains:

For our main we decided to share some meat pie (burek) and Cheese pie (sirnica). They are both traditional pies from Bosnia made of meat and cream cheese. I really liked burek and the meaty filling was amazing.

We then had some ‘Dragon of Bosnia’. This massive platter comes with a selection of meat accompanied by some rice and mashed potatoes. Firstly, I tried the beef steak with dry prunes, peppers, cognac and Worchester.

It was really tasty and I liked the gravy sauce accompanying it. Secondly, I digged into minced meat “čevapi” with beef prosciutto, cheese and vegetables in white cream sauce.

Again, I wasn’t disappointed. All flavours worked perfectly with each other. In addition to our platter, we aldo had some traditional Šopska salad- a season salad based on tomatoes and cucumber with cheese and some cucumber in cream.

Desserts:

For our dessert we had some home-made baklava and Tufahija, which is basically a boiled apple in a sauce served with nutty filling and topped up with some whipped cream. They were both yummy!

Overall experience:

We both enjoyed the food and atmosphere in this Bosnian restaurant. The restaurant is very popular-when we arrived at 12:00 there were just a few other tables taken but in around 30 minutes the restaurant was full of locals and expats so I would advise to book a table in advance.

Website:

For more information and to book visit:

https://sofra.hr/

Address:

Radnička cesta 37b

10000 Zagreb, Croatia

I hope you enjoyed reading this review!

X

Pauline

Last week, I was with my husband on a short weekend break in Zagreb in Croatia. During our stay in the Croatian capital, we dined in a range of traditional and oriental restaurants.

During the second day of our sightseeing, we booked a table at the popular local restaurant – Lanterna na Dolku.

Location:

Lanterna na Dolku is located in the city’s centre, on one of the oldest streets at the Dolac Market.

Owners pride themselves of sourcing most ingredients from the local market traders called ‘kumice’ to make sure that their all dishes prepared at the restaurant are fresh and use locally sourced ingredients.

Atmosphere:

Lanterna na Dolku has a lot of heritage to it and up to 40 people can be seated inside in an over 300 years old basement. In addition, up to 25 guests can sit on a terrace which overlooks the cathedral. When we arrived, the weather was lovely so we decided to sit outside, enjoy the weather and admire the surroundings.

We were welcomed by one of its founders-Tom. He was extremely professional and made us feel like we known him for ages. His customer service skills were excellent and the smile was constantly present on his face. He made us feel relaxed and joyful even before we started our meal.

The atmosphere of the restaurant is cosy and it has a homely décor. There were nice small flower arrangements on all the tables.

The menu:

The goal of restaurant’s founders was to combine the modern and the traditional in both the interior design and on the plate. The menu at Lanterna na Dolku offers a great selection of authentic Croatian dishes that were inspired by an old cookbook from 1854 that owners found in the Zagreb City Museum.

Starters:

Before we ordered our starters we decided to have a glass of white wine from a traditional Croatian winery.

While sipping our refreshing wine, we decided to share some cheese strudel wrapped in prosciutto which was really tasty.

Mains:

There was a nice choice of mains on Lanterna na Dolku’s menu. For these of you that read my blog regularly, you will probably know that I often choose fish as I love all seafood. I decided to have a sea bass fillet in truffle sauce with fresh truffles accompanied by some homemade croquettes. What can I say? Wow! Wow! Wow! It was simply amazing! I could have that meal every day. The flavours all worked perfectly with each other and it was simply delicious.

My husband decided to have Pil-grill- a chicken fillet with tomatoes, cheese and peas. It was flavoursome and he finished it all in no time.

Desserts:

We asked Tom to recommend 2 desserts to us and he told us that we need to try: Lanterna štrukli and Lanterna mousse which are both restaurant’s signature sweet courses. We listened to his endorsement and decided to share both of these desserts.

Lanterna štrukli in blueberry sauce recently won a prize at the Austrian baking competition and it was mouth-watering.

Lanterna mousse on the other hand was a perfect blend of mousse with cookies and chocolate. They were both delicious.

Overall experience:

We both had a great time in this family run restaurant. Lanterna na Dolku serves delicious traditional food with a modern twist using only the highest quality, locally sourced, fresh ingredients. I absolutely loved my sea bass so if you like sea food then you should look no further and give it a go. The service was excellent, location is superb and the restaurant serves real ‘homely’ dishes so I would recommend it to anyone visiting Zagreb in a heartbeat. Lanterna na Dolku is where you come to if you want to feel at home to have a beautifully presented and flavoursome traditional meal.

Website:

For more information and to book visit:

http://www.lanterna-zagreb.com/en/

Address:

Opatovina 31,

10000 Zagreb, Croatia

I hope you enjoyed reading this review!

X

Pauline

As some of you know, I am currently on a weekend break in Zagreb in Croatia. We arrived here on Friday afternoon and decided to have our dinner at the Gostionica Restoran Purger Purger restaurant which is around 15 min walk from the hotel we are staying in.

Location:

Gostionica Restoran Purger is located in the city centre on in Petrinjska Street and just around a corner from the tourist information office and the old town.

Atmosphere:

Now this is what really makes this restaurant, the staff are friendly and the whole place has a family run feel about it. We were surrounded the entire evening by groups of older locals all having a great time a true sign that a restaurant is doing something right.

The atmosphere of the restaurant is cozy and it has a homely décor. There were nice summer flowers and paintings brightening its traditional setting.

The menu:

The menu at The Gostionica Restoran Purger offers a nice selection of traditional dishes that are all built around the family recipes since 1932. Restaurant offers a number of stews, grilled dishes, and traditional desserts.

Starters:

To start, we decided to share some deep-fried cheese. It was served with a bit of homemade tartare and was tasty.

Mains:

There was a nice choice of mains. I decided to have some mixed grill.

The portion was enormous and flavoursome. My husband had a Pork Cutlet Sambour style and also enjoyed it. We ordered some sopska salad to share.

After having 2 massive mains, we decided to skip a dessert.

Overall experience:

We both had a nice time at The Gostionica Restoran Purger. It serves nice, simple food so it would be great to visit if you like to try some real ‘homely’ dishes. This isn’t the place to come to if you want tea spoon sized portions, this is where you come to if you want to feel at home, like a local and have a proper hearty traditional meal.

Website:

For more information and to book visit:

http://www.purger.hr/

Address:

Petrinjska ul. 33, 10000, Zagreb, Croatia

I hope you enjoyed reading this review!

X

Pauline