Another Christmas is over, another year is coming to a close. The festive cookies that we baked before Christmas are still in sufficient supply, but we have already finished cream-filled Honey Dough Slices and Štedrák – the traditional Christmas cake that would loosely translate as Generous Cake into English. To sweeten the last day of the 2023, which is called Silvester here in Slovakia, I have decided to bake this easy but delicious apricot cake. A dozen jars of apricot jam made in the summer are still sitting in the pantry together with a couple of bottled apricots preserved in their syrup ..read more

It’s been far from a relaxed summer this year. It started as usual with a slow-down at the beginning of July. Then, a couple of weeks later, life took an unexpected turn. I’d been busy working in a children’s summer camp. It was hard but rewarding and I enjoyed the work. There were quite a few Ukrainian children, but they seemed much more at home than last summer. Despite being tired at times, I felt a sense of purpose and achievement. Then, all of a sudden, the news came that my niece had been put in a coma after a complicated childbirth. She died a few days later, leaving behind her husband ..read more

At nine o’ clock in the morning the roads are surprisingly quiet. It’s Good Friday – a public holiday, and most Slovaks have either moved to their holiday destinations, or are getting their homes ready for Easter. We should be officially welcoming spring at this time of year, but the weather has decided to play a trick on us. Fine snowflakes are floating in the air as we are leaving home; it feels more like Christmas than Easter. We are driving to a small town of Kremnica where there is a quaint museum that promises a unique experience: a return to the 1920s and the story of Atkáry’s potato. I ..read more

Three volumes of A Taste of Slovakia series have been published to this date. The Summer Book, which came out at the end of 2016, is already sold out. The Autumn/Fall Book followed three years later and the new Winter Book has just come out. If you want to know where the books can be found, here is a list of places that sell them: Slovakia Kníhkupectvá Artforum (Artforum bookshops): https://www.artforum.sk/katalog/132923/a-taste-of-slovakia-2-autumn https://www.artforum.sk/katalog/173991/a-taste-of-slovakia-3-winter Kníhkupectvá Martinus (Martinus bookshops): https://www.martinus.sk/seria/a-ta ..read more

It’s between September and November when the main cabbage harvest takes place in Slovakia. Although we grow spring and midsummer varieties that are harvested earlier in the year, autumn is the prime season for collecting firm storage cultivars and those that go in sauerkraut. It is also the best time to visit Slovakia if you want to try all the cabbage specialities our cuisine has to offer. The largest and most famous cabbage festival is held at the beginning of October in Stupava – a small town just a stone’s throw from Bratislava, Slovakia’s capital. If you prefer less crowded, low profile e ..read more

First things first – you wouldn’t hear about a starter or a dessert a hundred years ago, when kashas were part of each and every Slovak wedding. There was no wedding menu as we know it today, neither was there a written seating plan or candles or confetti. Yet there were quite a few norms, traditions and rituals carried out throughout the wedding night, some of them unique to a particular region or area. Photo courtesy of Iveta Balážová Kasha (a kind of porridge) appeared in all Slavic weddings, not only Slovak ones. It was seen as a symbol of abundance and prosperity back in the first half of ..read more

Soups are rarely missing from a Slovak table, no matter what time of year it is. Sometimes they are clear meat or vegetable stocks with pasta added towards the end of cooking. These are usually served as starters or appetizers. At other times, they can be filling enough to stand as the main course, like this Creamy Bean Soup, especially when eaten with slices of homemade bread or yeasted rolls. Although kohlrabi is very common in the Slovak diet, it is rarely used as the soup’s main ingredient. We usually add it to stocks alongside other vegetables like carrot, parsley root and celery root. Or ..read more

Putting together a cookbook during a global pandemic wasn’t as easy as you might think. True, I had enough time for writing and testing recipes. I spent hours in the kitchen, and I didn’t complain. Quite the oppostite, it was relaxing, sort of therapeautic. Doing online research was less fun, because we were all overloaded with Zooming, Team meetings or Skypeing. Yes, we all missed face-to-face interactions. With lockdowns, travel restrictions and all social events cancelled, it was also hard to arrange for photo shoots, some of which were essential for the book. Those that I didn’t manage to ..read more

Just six kilometres north of the historical town of Bardejov – one of the Slovak UNESCO sights – lies a spa resort of Bardejovské kúpele. Set amid rolling hills and lush woodlands, it is a place of exceptional beauty, peace and calm. No wonder that some historical documents list it as ‘the spa of tranquility’. Located in the north-east of Slovakia, far away from large urban and industrial areas, Bardejovské kúpele boasts the best quality of air in Slovakia. There are 10 natural mineral springs, each with a very favourable chemical composition and remarkable therapeutic effects. People from the ..read more

It’s been a while since I last posted here, but the reasons were sound and many. First, I’ve been working on the third book of A Taste of Slovakia series and wanted to get the first chapter ready for Jana – the graphic designer. I’m planning to publish the Winter Book towards the end of September, and there are still some loose ends to be tied up. Second, I had Covid at the beginning of March and though it wasn’t too bad, I felt quite tired for a couple of weeks. It took me another 3 weeks to recover completely. While I was fighting the coronavirus, Ukrainian people on our eastern border were ..read more