At this (long) table no one grows old
It must be ten years since I was last in Dubrovnik, that beautiful red-rooved Croatian city on the Adriatic Sea. I loved it, and was very taken at the time with the food there. I particularly remember a brilliant street market that we happened upon, with all kinds of offerings and tastings.
This autumn, there’s a food festival in the city – from October 18-21 – which will feature wine tasting, food workshops, ‘eat and walk’ culinary tours and, on the final day, a long table running the length of the city’s famous Stradun street where hotel chefs, restaurateurs and pasty makers will all present their wares.
Among those represented will undoubtedly be a number of the city’s particularly ‘foodie’ hotels and restaurants – places like Bowa, located on the island of Sipan, close to Dubrovnik, and a place where you will enjoy the finest vegetables from the restaurant’s own garden, or Proto, a restaurant in the city’s old town dating from the 19th century, and one of the best places for fish in all of Dubrovnik. Then there’s the Villa Orsula, with its fusion menu, or Taverna Maslina, the beachfront restaurant of the Hotel Dubrovnik Palace, a hotel with magnificent views, located as it is right on the edge of the Lapad peninsula, or the brand new Sensus restaurant in the five-star Hotel Excelsior with its wonderful setting on a terrace overlooking the sea. I remember gawping at the Excelsior in all its glory when we used to regularly take the boat from our base in Cavtat to Dubrovnik when we were there a decade ago.
If you are going to Dubrovnik this October, bear in mind it’s also truffle season in nearby Istria – last year they made it into the Guinness Book Of Records with the world’s longest running truffle festival. This year there will be another twomonth extravaganza.