All about the cuisine of Montenegro

The further we go on vacation from home, the more we want to learn and try everything new - these are beaches and ski trails, local sights and traditions, fashion and, of course, cuisine. Remember yourself: almost always, tourists choose excursions to original villages and restaurants of national cuisine to breathe in local flavors, taste food and drinks, try to understand the country and the people who allowed to touch their culture. And Montenegro, fortunately, is no exception. Let's get acquainted with the cuisine of this country!

Montenegro cuisine will certainly please those for whom food is a delight. It will double delight those who love to eat a lot, because here they put food on the plates without sparing, and the food is nourishing. Many tourists take in restaurants and cafes one serving for 2-3 people. Montenegrins are meat lovers, and the farther into the mountains, the more meat and cheese. On the coast, guests will be served fish dishes, but this, unfortunately, is expensive not only for tourists, but also for the Montenegrins themselves, because there is no commercial fishing here.

Those who prefer proper nutrition, too, will not go hungry - because This is a southern country where they grow a large amount of vegetables and fruits. Of course, as in a mountainous country without natural cheese and dairy products with hot tortilla or bread fresh from the oven.

The beauty of this kitchen is in her diversity: Many dishes of the former Yugoslavia are similar to the cuisine of neighboring countries (Turkey and Albania, Italy and Austria, Hungary). And since this is a mixture of west and east, then the menu in restaurants of hotels and street trays will be very diverse.

There are few industrial enterprises in the country (and they are far from tourist routes), plants try to grow without the use of chemicals. But meat is purchased in Serbia, where animals grow in natural conditions. Result: farmers do not make sense to use genetically modified feed for animals and plants, so the food is natural and very tasty.

Each community (region) has its own culinary secrets, so often in the name of the dishes there are the names of the townships: tsrmnitsko varivo, trout in podgoritski, negushsky steak. To try homemade national food, go to local taverns - konobya.

Another feature of the Montenegrin cuisine, rather related to work in the tourism business, is the preference for simple dishes with a small amount of fat and spices. There is little fried in oil (as in the Eastern cuisine), much more stewed, baked on charcoal or fried over an open fire.

Montenegrins have a dish - an aperitif meze - cut from different meats, cheeses and olives. Next put a dish with slices of boiled eggs and pickled cucumbers. And if the guests satisfied the first hunger, then it is time to serve the first.

Liquid hot dishes in Montenegro love, as in all Slavic countries. There are two varieties of the first: soup and chorba. The soup is called clear broth with the addition of meat, which is filled with noodles, vegetables, rice.Seafood soup is even easier than meat. Prepare it on the coast.

Chorba - thick, rich meat or fish soup. She looks like a Hungarian goulash in its density. If you get the following names in the menu, then know what they mean:

• chorba od vrcha - broth with vegetables;
• chorba od kopriva - soup with nettles in chicken broth or vegetarian;
• pilecha chorba - first on chicken meat;
• govege chorba - rich broth with beef and vegetables, but without potatoes;
• Ribla Chorba - fish first course, it is prepared from several types of fish, filled with flour for thickening and do not spare spicy spices.

The second is traditionally understood as a hot dish. But Montenegro is also famous for appetizers and salads. But cereals are not very popular. However, breakfast is often offered tzitsvara - mashed potatoes, which are obtained from cornmeal and young cheese. Zitsvara washed down with milk or yogurt, or eat a bit of sugar with potatoes.

The second variant of the traditional breakfast is parrot: stale bread is soaked in milk with the addition of butter and young cheese. Rustic hearty meal eaten with yogurt.

From the appetizers, the main dish is prshut - the visiting card of Montenegro. This is an analogue of jamon, which can be bought in any store. It is the vacuum-packed prshut that the guests of the country are bringing as a gift. In the Montenegrin village of Negushi, original recipes for smoking and drying ham (pork or much less beef) are preserved. From the start of production to full readiness 4-24 months pass The longer sustained prshut, so it is more expensive. Dried meat must be used for meze, a separate snack or as an ingredient in other dishes.

But other meat dishes are no less popular:

• brave to me - lamb meat stewed in milk;

• hangman - This is a chop, which is wrapped in cheese and prshut;

• Meso Meso - This is an assortment of grilled meat dishes that are usually offered in restaurants of hotels;

• Muchkalitsa - pork, which was first fried on an open fire, and then stewed with vegetables;

• Negush steak - beef steak, which is wrapped in prshut and Kaymak cheese;

• pashtitsada - stew in sauce, mixed with dumplings or pasta;

• biscuit - roasted meat on a spit;

• pleskavitsa - a flat cutlet with a diameter of 20 cm, which is made only from meat and onions, and it is fried without breading;

• razhnichi - small beef or pork shish kebab;

• sarma - very small cabbage rolls;

• chevapchichi (chevapi) - grilled sausages made from finely chopped lamb and veal;

• Montenegrin Pork Schnitzel - These are meat tubes with Kaymak, which were breaded with flour, egg, and then dried breadcrumbs, and fried;

• lamb from under a sacha - one of the specialties of Montenegro, which is prepared in a sachet (cast iron pot) for 3-6 hours.

Fish and seafood is also very popular with tourists, although it is expensive dishes. But the closer to the south of the country, the greater the chance of tasting oysters and shrimp, squid and mussels - prices here are much lower. You can prepare meals on your own from a freshly purchased catch, or you can visit a seafood restaurant or an outdoor tent. In any case, it will be incredibly tasty, especially for the local white wine "Krstac". The following delicacies are most popular and famous:

• Dalmatian goulash - several types of fish stewed with tomato sauce and spices;

• scadar carp - fish caught in Skadar Lake and baked in a pan using a sauce of prunes with the addition of apples or quince, as the cooking process turns into a jelly;

• mussels with crispy fresh bread - served with white or red Buzara sauce;

• octopus, grilled;

• pilaf with a variety of seafood;

• przheni ligni - squids, often fried in batter;

• Ohrid fish - a dish of fish fillets, onions, grated potatoes and cream, which is cooked in pots, served with pickles;

• black risotto with cuttlefish ink;

• yaprake - Baked carp, poured with plenty of cream.

The garnish is served with vegetables cooked in pieces or in a mushy form: Dalmatian varivo, kachamak, paprika, and gyros.

Sour milk products and local cheeses - another yummy, which is worth to come to Montenegro.

• Kaymak - fermented baked milk resembling at the same time cottage cheese, sour cream and butter. They eat with a spoon or like cheese spread on bread. In the menu of restaurants you need to look for this salted product called Cream. It is added to many dishes.
• Negushsky cheese - Another business card of this place. It is prepared in the original recipe from sheep's milk, but often mixed with goat or cow milk. Cheese can be young (resembles less salty cheese) and hard, smoked or in olive oil, with pepper or pryht, with greens or berries. This may be a snack or ingredient for salads, burek pies, desserts.
• Lisnati - Sheet sweetish cheese, popular in the mountain Kolasin, made from cow's milk of the morning and evening milking.

In Montenegro, a huge variety of dishes that taste at the end of the feast. Of course, now these goodies can be tasted not only in restaurants, but also bought to try them on the go. Treat sweets:

• "Girl's Evening" - roll stuffed with raisins, figs and walnuts;
• crone - donuts, inside of which can be marmalade, chocolate, custard;
• palachinka - huge pancakes wrapped in jam, sweet cream, hot chocolate, but the dish can be unsweetened, if the filling is filled with cottage cheese, prshut, cheese, ham;
• baklava - the famous oriental sweet with raisins and walnuts;
• tulumba - very sweet pieces of dough due to wetting them in syrup or honey.

For unsweetened, but no less tasty, the liver include:

• burek - puff pie filled with cheese or meat;
• Gibanica - cottage cheese pie;
• strukli - cheese (cottage cheese), nuts and plums are wrapped in dough, baked in the oven or boiled in salted water.

For Montenegrins, tea is a medicine made from chamomile or mint, and coffee is a drink that you can drink around the clock. Another popular drink is lemonade, but it is not mixed with sugar (it is served separately). If you are lucky, ask the hostess to buy a drink from a wild pomegranate, which is not sold in stores.

Beer lovers can appreciate the dark, light or with additives local drink "Nikshichko", which has recently been exported under the brand "NIK".

And, of course, it would be strange if in the country of berries and fruits wine and liqueur were not made:

• from quince, apples, spruce young twigs, blueberries make amazing liqueurs;
• "Home-made rum" - this is (for some reason) sweet homemade rum;
• Vranac and Krstach - The best wines presented in stores;
• rakia - vodka on fruit (strength - 50 degrees).

Montenegro will delight you with an abundance of local fruits. Lovers of pineapples, bananas and coconuts are not lucky - they do not grow here. But an incomplete list of what is growing and selling here:

• in the spring - Kiwi and oranges;
• in June - Strawberries, cherries and cherries;
• in July - apricots and peaches, mangoes and apples, pears and plums, melons and green figs, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, loquat;
• in August - begins to sing figs and pomegranates, watermelons;
• in the autumn grapes, tangerines, kumquat, persimmon and zinzula ripen actively.

All about the cuisine of Montenegro, see the following video.