VERY RICH BEAN SOUP WITH PASTA

Big variety of vegetable soups with many different ingredients, all depending on the season and what you have in the fridge, can be a delicious starter to lunch or dinner. Very often we make a thicker soup like stew and serve it as a complete one pot meal together with bread and dessert afterwards. This recipe is one of that kind. It is easy to make and delicious to eat!

Thick bean soup-stew with pasta.

SEGEDINER GOULASH - GOULASH WITH SOUERKRAUT

"Segediner" is Slovenian short name for Segediner Goulash, which originated from Hungary.

Through our history we were also a part of Austro-Hungarian empire. We still have a big Hungarian minority on the North-East side of Slovenia. So it is not unusual that we adopted influences of their culture. Among those, we took some recipes and adopted them as ours. Goulash is now cooked all around Slovenia. In winter time segediner, goulash with souerkraut, is the most popular.

Segedin goulash - delicious winter dish

"MEDENJAKI" - HONEY BISCUITS - GINGER BREAD

We usually make honey biscuits in different shapes for Christmas, other holidays and celebrations.   As we are approaching Valentine's Day,  hearts in any shape are in demand. Maybe honey biscuits  can make your day too. 

Honey biscuits - ginger bread

BUHTELJNI - LEAVENED POCKETS STUFFED WITH JAM

Buhteljni are very traditional Slovenian dessert made of soft sweet leavened dough stuffed with jam inside. They can be served as a "sweet breakfast" or dessert with coffee or tea. We usually made them as a dessert for  lunch in winter time after some hot pot soup or stew for example barley soup or ričet, mushrooms soup, jota etc.

Buhteljni

DELICIOUS CHICKEN STEW

Chicken meat is probably the most common meat in our diet. It can be prepared in many different ways. We higly appriciate chicken soup, especially if good home groven chicken is available. We often make chicken roast stuffed with some tasty filling - link, we fry it coated with eggs and bread crumbs etc. 
If you have enough of roasted or fried chicken then try this recipe. You will be nicely surprised with the flavour of this delicious chicken stew. 

Chicken stew

MUSHROOMS SAUCE WITH CREAM

This very simple and delicious sauce is really easy to make. It is excellent with all kinds of meat dishes. It can be also made with any pasta and served as a main dish. 

Mushrooms sauce with cream.

RIČET - TRADITIONAL SLOVENIAN BARLEY SOUP

Is one of many thick soups,  stews or hot pots in Slovenian cuisine that used to be on our menus often, at least once a week.  It is becoming very popular again. It is actually very healthy and nutritious dish that can be made as a completely vegetarian dish. Traditionally it is made with a nice peace of smoked pork or "Kranjska klobasa - Carniola sausage" that adds  to a reach flavour and of course, calories. 

Traditional Barley thick soup, stew with Carniola sausage.

PUSTNI KROFI - SLOVENIAN CARNIVAL DOUGHNUTS

In Slovenia, like in many other countries around the world, we celebratE the Carnival Season. For us, the carnival is called Pust. Pust scares the Winter away and welcomes the Spring to begin. Many towns in Slovenia, for example Ptuj or Cerknica, are famous for their Carnival. Like other festivities, Pust has some traditional dishes to celebrate with. This is also time before the beginning of fasting in Christianity, so the last chance to eat very rich food before Easter. The old saying tells us that Pust has to be fat, greasy around the mouth in order to have good harvest later in the year. 
Among famous traditional dishes are Pustni krofi - Carnival Doughnuts and Krhki flancati - Brittle Flancati. 

Pustni krofi - Carnival Doughnuts

MASHROOMS SOUP

Slovenia is a country covered with forests. Hiking through in the woods and picking up mushrooms is one of the most common hobbies of Slovenian people. We are preparing mushrooms in many different ways. Very traditional mushroom dish is a mushroom soup. It is usually served in restaurants as a starter, but it can also be served as a main dish together with buckwheat spoon bread, see the recipe. 

Mushroom soup

JOTA

Jota is like a hotpot, thick soup or a vegetable-meat stew. This very traditional dish comes from Western part of Slovenia, Primorska Region. It can be made with sour cabbage or sour turnips and potatoes, beans and a beat of ham or sausages. It is what we call a real winter dish.

Jota, traditional Slovenian thick soup.

SLOVENIAN DRY FRUITS BREAD - CHRISTMAS BREAD

Holiday season is approaching fast. In December, many fairs and festivals offer traditional Christmas cake or bread. Every country has its own specialities for the holiday season. In Slovenia we have a few very traditional cakes and breads. 
Sweet bread made of dry fruits and walnuts is only one of them. This one is easy to make, very tasty and healthy. It is also completely vegan. 

Dry fruits bread 

BUCKWHEAT ŠTRUKLJI - BUCKWHEAT ROLLS with WALNUTS

BUCKWHEAT ŠTRUKLJI - BUCKWHEAT ROLLS with WALNUTS

Štruklji, in Slovenian language, is a very traditional Slovenian dish. This dish is made of different doughs as well as different fillings. It can be cooked or baked, served as main or side dish. Štruklji can also be a delicious dessert. 

Buckwheat rolls with walnuts

APPLE PIE

Apple pie is a very old, very traditional and very popular recipe that can be made in many different ways. We all know the famous American version. However, in Europe many countries have their own traditional recipe. We make many different pies in Slovenia and almost everyone makes it a bit differently. 

My apple pie

STUFFED CHICKEN ROAST

Stuffed Roast like chicken, goose, veal breast, pork ribs is considered to be a real festive dish. It is usually prepared for big family celebrations. What meat or filling is used, is up to you. But for certain holidays,  we prefer certain meat and fillings. For St.Martins day that is goose stuffed with chestnuts and apples. 

This time I made chicken stuffed with bread filling, which is also very traditional. Served together with Red cabbage stew and a glass of good wine, is a very delicious meal.

Stuffed chicken with red cabbage stew.

STEWED RED CABBAGE

November in Slovenia is in many ways a very special month. We have two traditionally important holidays. November the 1st, when we remember our ancestors and St. Martins day on November the 11th when we celebrate the arrival of the new wine.
November is also thought to be an introduction into winter. It can be cold and wet, snow and frost are also not unusual. It is the last month of autumn and sometimes, like this year, it can be still sunny and even warm. 

Autumn, so beautiful part of the year

So colourful, so rich

AJDOV KRAPEC - BUCKWHEAT CAKE with COTTAGE CHEESE

Traditional buckwheat cake with cottage cheese can be sweet or savoury dish. It can be served as a delicious and healthy dessert, a very tasty appetiser or a side dish. The cake was traditionally baked in special bread oven built of bricks, which made the cake even more delicious.

Buckwheat cake with cottage cheese

ŽLIKROFI with SPINACH and COTTAGE CHEESE

We make the dough same as for IDRIJA ŽLIKROFI. As for the filling we can be very creative and try to do our own version, recipe. I will make few different kinds of žlikrofi today as follows.

ŽLIKROFI stuffed with Spinach and Cottage cheese 

Ingredients for the filling:

200 g fresh Spinach

200 g Cottage cheese - or Tofu

1 egg

1-2 tbs of semolina or bread crumbs

2 cloves of garlic

Vegetable oil or ghee

Salt

Black pepper 

Nutmeg

Put spinach into boiling water for a few minutes until it is cooked, then we chop or blend it and drain all water out. Put vegetable oil or ghee in the pan, add garlic, stir for a few seconds, and add spinach and all the spices. 

Wait until it cools down a bit and then add it to Cottage cheese. Add egg and mix all well together. 

Spinach - wash, cook add spices

Cottage cheese - skuta

The filling must not be too soft. To make it thicker, add breadcrumbs or semolina.

Mix spinach with skuta, egg

and semolina to make it thicker.

Now we can make our žlikrofi as we did before. 

Roll the dough over the filling, and pinch it together. Press the edges firmly, so they stick. Press each one down in the middle, to get the right shape, but be careful not to break the dough.  

Place the filling on the rolled dough.

Make  zlikrofi as in previous recipe.

Cook them in salty boiling water until they float on the surface. Drain them and serve as you want - it can be in the soup or dashi instead of noodles or with meat stew, mushroom and cream sauce etc.

This time I served them in chicken soup - all kind of vegetables, chicken, water, spices. Cook on low fire one to two hours.   

Cook the broth from chicken, 

vegetables and spices.

Clear chicken soup with žlikrof.

More photos on this link!

ŽLIKROFI with fish meat filling

You can use the same recipe for the dough to make different kind of žlikrofi, just use your imagination. I can give you some hints:

Žlikrofi stuffed with fish meat 

Ingredients for the filling:

200 g white fish without bones

3 cloves of garlic

Nira or parsley or both - finely chopped

Salt

Black pepper

Put all the ingredients in a blender and mix all together to get a thick paste. Make small balls. Now you can make žlikrofi as in previous recipes. Roll the dough, place the filling on it, roll the dough over the filling, press down between the filling and cut them. Make characteristic shape of the "hat with ears".

Mix well all ingredients and make small balls.

Press down the space between 2 balls,
cut, ...

and make žlikrofi. The shape will become better with the exercise.

Cook them in salty boiling water till they start to float on the surface and serve them hot with a sauce you like. I love to serve them with simple vegetable sauce - onions, garlic, bell pepper and tomatoes with spices.  

Or serve them very simply topped with butter, chives, parsley and broccoli  as in the photo below.  

Žlikrofi with stuffed with fish meat. 

More photos on this link.

ABOUT SLOVENIA and SLOVENIAN FOOD

Slovenia is a "small" country in Central Europe located in the Northern part of Balkan Peninsula, between the Adriatic sea, Southern  Alps, Pannonian Plains and Dinaric Karst Mountains. 

Slovenia borders Italy in the West, Austria in the North, Hungary in the East and Croatia in the South.

The geographical position of Slovenia on the crossroads between the North and the South, the East and the West of Europe, always played an important  role.  Throughout the history this transient position shaped our way of life, our culture as different influences can be noticed in all parts of our culture. 

Despite its "small" size, Slovenia is a country of a lot of varieties. This is also one of the most important characteristics of the Slovenian cuisine, which can be described not as one but as a mix of many different cuisines. In our food we can see influences of our neighbouring countries, regions and also migrations that took place across our territory. We can talk about influences from the Mediterranean Cuisine, Central European Cuisine - from Germany, Austria and France, then Hungarian Cuisine and the Cuisines of the Balkan Region that were historically very much influenced by Byzantium and Turkish Cuisines. We also have to take into account our Slavic origins and the specifics of our social structure and its development throughout history.  For many centuries we were under foreign reign. 

Slovenian food is based on a very simple and modest rustic - farmers diet made of very few different ingredients, mostly wheat -  bread, žganci, kaša and a few vegetables, which our chefs slowly developed into a rich and diverse cuisine by adding their own creativity and their own way of preparing the dishes. In different parts of Slovenia the same dish can be prepared in a different way, for example žganci, which makes our cuisine even more interesting and diverse. Over time, new foods were introduced and incorporated into our everyday cooking. Today we are talking about 24 gastronomic regions with many specific local dishes of their own. We can proudly say that our cuisine can compete and be compared to cuisines that are well known and appreciated all around the globe.

From simple farmers food like bread and žganci
towards diversity and excellence.  

In the last few decades the way of life has been changing fast. With globalisation a lot of new influences arrived, a lot of new foods were introduced and we can say that fast food took over slow food. Preparing traditional food in many cases means slow cooking and a lot of preparation. Today families don't want to spend so much time cooking and traditional recipes are starting to sink into oblivion.  Luckily we have many experts and enthusiasts who want to preserve and revive traditional cooking. There are more and more restaurants that have at least a few traditional dishes incorporated in their modern way of cooking, which is very much appreciated by their guests. This is also a living proof that our traditional dishes are very tasty and can be easily incorporated into modern fusions. 

As a member of the EU family, we registered and protected many of our traditional dishes, for which we received European certificates. We still have a long way to go and as dr. Janez Bogotaj says, we have to be much more determined and not so modest, because we have great food with excellent tastes to offer to the world. 

In last 15 years of my life I had an opportunity to live in a very different countries around the world. As a sociologist I want to learn as much as possible about different cultures, traditions… I can see how important part of every society, culture is food. And what amazes me the most is really big variety from which  we can all  benefit and enjoy. 

I can say that cooking is my hobby. I always enjoyed preparing some special meal or baking something special for family and friends. When abroad I have the opportunity to present Slovenian food, my way of course, to different people and I think they like that. In Japan where I am at the moment I am surprised, again and again, with their interest for everything new and different. And there is also something special about our food which makes this connection even stronger and that is buckwheat - soba - ajda. We have many traditional dishes where the buckwheat flour or seeds - kaša are the main ingredients. They are very tasty, not to mention how healthy they are. 

In this blog I will present some traditional recipes of Slovenian cuisine and also some other dishes that are often on my family menu and I think might be interesting for you. I hope you will be able to enjoy it too.

IDRIJA ŽLIKROFI - DUMPLINGS

Idrija Žlikrofi  are very traditional Slovenian dish from Idrija, a small town in Western part of the country. Idrija is known for Mercury Mine which was listed on the  Unesco World Heritage  in 2012. It also has a long tradition in lace making.

 Typical shape of the hat with ears.