Mit - Index

Mit - SINFO March 2008 No.6 - Index

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super-sweet aniseed curved cookie.
steaks were once alive anyway!), or let Rudi seat you. Beware of
overloading your stomach with Veronika's home-made breads
and spreads. She bakes at least 5 or 6 different kinds of bread
every day − buckwheat bread with walnuts and hazelnuts; mixed
bread from wheat, maize, and buckwheat flour; rye bread with
aniseed, caraway, and mint; Teran bread with figs; white bread
with olives; carob or corn bread with seeds; and breads with
poppy seeds, onions, and even dandelion, or zucchini, according
to the season. Seeing Verona kneading bread dough, letting it
rise, and then baking it, you might be mislead into erroneously
thinking that making bread is very easy.
And on top of the bread, treat yourself to the dentex beefsteak.
Veronika grinds cooked fillets in a food mixer, and adds double
cream, Muscat, pepper, salt, parsley, oregano, and rosemary.
Of course, she first crushes the spices in a mortar. Or try meat
pâté with chopped browned porcini. What an overture! Besides,
Veronika's kitchen is renowned for good old dishes, such as
stuffed breast of veal, roasted shoulder of veal, or veal caul
Parisian style. Sometimes you can also get sweetbreads (minced
tripes rolled in filo pastry), which, thanks to the crispiness
of its crust and accompanied by potato salad, is the best hot
appetiser you can think of, in spite of your love of escargots or
frogs legs, or thinking that something less classy is not good
enough. Sweetbread is the right dish for a hungry mouth indeed.
However, vegetarians shall not be deprived of culinary pleasures.
They should have pastry turnovers, filled with freshly picked bear
garlic (also called ramson; whose season is spring), and homemade
buckwheat mash. Meat-eaters should control themselves,
so as not to steal from their plates.
As for the wine, produced locally in recognised cellars, there will
be no shortcomings. Leave it to Rudi's reliable guidance again.
From the wide variety on offer, there are nearly ten kinds of
unbottled wines alone. The best wine to go with veal sweetbread
or veal caul is unbottled cviËek, whose lightness and acid can
neutralise the taste of meat. At the same time, Pr' Bizjak is a
typical homely inn, where fried chicken, rolled in bread crumbs,
still remains a very good choice. However, this does not mean
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you should refrain from having a horse steak, marinated at home,
a pepper beefsteak, or a honey-brown roasted juicy knuckle.
Perhaps a potato goulash, abundant in chanterelle mushrooms
will be to your taste? It is rich in home-grown herbs: thyme,
marjoram, peppercorns, a pinch of ground caraway seed, homemade
paprika, and two or three bay leaves. If you have trout with
zucchini and porcini, you will still have room for a home-made
dessert. If you are a big eater, have a go at Veronika's variations
of venison. You must have carrot or mangold štruklji (cooked
batter with stuffing) on the side.
Yes, the desserts. If one regularly bakes so many kinds of bread,
making desserts is not a problem. The good old Slovenian strudl,
a filo pastry roll with apple and raisin stuffing, is a wonderful
and juicy classic. Nevertheless, you can always treat yourself with
various custards, cakes (if there are still some frozen chestnuts,
Veronika might even make a chestnut cake), the usual pancakes,
or the recommended giant aniseed curved cookie in a wonderful
combination with a scoop of ice-cream. The area under Mt StoržiË
is very nice for a walk after a meal, whereas Veronika will gladly
lend you a football for a rousing game right in their meadow.
potato goulash, abundant in chanterelle mushrooms.