Tour Guide, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina
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If you are coming to Bosnia and Herzegovina for its gastronomical offer you won´t go away hungry for sure. Moreover be prepared to weight couple of pounds more. Bosnia and Herzegovina is specific in many ways and one of them is its cuisine.
BiH is characterized with fresh air, clean water and fertile ground and when you combine that with its history that mixes east and west you get one of a kind cuisine with unique way of preparing meals.
History of Bosnia and Herzegovina is woven in traditional cuisine. It is a mix of traditional Arab, Turkish and Austro-Hungarian food traditions. But it is specific because of its mix of oriental, western and religious heritage. Meals do come from those countries but are different from their tradition, because they got distinctive tinge, typical only for Bosnia and Herzegovina. For example, “sataraš” (satarash) is a dish made with bell peppers, eggplants, onions and tomatoes, you can find it in many cuisines but only in Bosnian is spiced with “kajmak” (clotted cream). In Greece you can eat cabbage pie but in BiH filling and dough are different. Same is with pumpkin pie which you can have in USA.
Bosnian cuisine uses many spices and most of meals are cooked in lots of water. Because of that meals abound in sauce, which is natural because of vegetables cooked in it. The most common vegetable ingredients are: potato, onions, garlic, tomato, cucumbers, cabbage, spinach, courgette, dried and fresh beans, bell peppers, carrots… Now it`s time to mention that meat is one of main ingredients. Many dishes use meat such as lamb and beef in combine with vegetables. So vegetarians and vegans will have slight smaller choice of dishes, but I guarantee, they will leave with full stomach. And I have a proof for that. In summer 2013. American author Kim Fielding visited Bosnia and Herzegovina. After her visit she wrote:
-When I told my Croatian friends I was going to visit BiH, they all said, “You must have ćevapčići!” However, I don’t eat red meat, so I skipped that dish. That hardly meant I starved, though. I had delicious burek, squid ink risotto, and trout with blitva. I’m especially a fan of burek, which is a dish most Americans are unfamiliar with. The sweets were wonderful too—probably the best baklava I’ve ever had and rahatlokum, which is hard to find in the US. And of course I drank a lot of Bosnian coffee, so I had plenty of caffeine to give me fuel as I walked around Sarajevo and Mostar.
Another visitor Jose Luis Gomez wrote this on his blog:
”…I am beginning to remember the faint scent of something I grew especially fond of in Sarajevo. And that something is food, food that was so different from what I had been used to in the states…
The WHO in report for 2011. stated that Bosnia and Herzegovina, when it comes to food safety, is in level or above average compared to other countries in the region.
I will divide gastronomy in two categories. Hard and spicy which is typical for region of Bosnia, and the other part, Herzegovina, has a bit lighter dishes which tilt to Mediterranean cuisine.
While in Bosnia ( Sarajevo, Visoko, Vareš, Travnik, Tuzla; Zenica, Banja Luka…) try dishes that are typical for this region. First place take “ćevapi” (small grilled meat sausages made of lamb and beef mix, served with onions, sour cream, ajvar and somun), you also have Banja Luka variation of ćevapi (pronounced: chevapee).
Try both and decide which are better. After that you can have many variations of pie: burek (meat pie), zeljanica (spinach pie), sirnica (cheese pie), krompiruša (potato pie), sogan dolma (onions stuffed with minced meat), sarma (meat and rice rolled in pickled cabbage leaves), bosanski lonac ( meat stew cooked over an open fire), dolma (fried bell peppers stuffed with minced meat), tarhana ( soup with homemade pasta), meat under sač (a traditional way of cooking lamb, veal, or goat under a metal, ceramic, or earthenware lid on which hot coals and ashes are heaped) “one of my favorite“, and of course you can`t leave without trying sudžuk (spicy beef sausage) and suho meso (air-dried meat).
All of this you have to pour with a glass of spirit. You can try many versions such as šljivovica (plum brandy), kruška (pear brandy), jabukovača (apple brandy) and many more.
If you are traveling to Herzegovina (Mostar, Konjic, Počitelj, Čapljina, Stolac, Trebinje, Međugorje, Ljubuški, Neum…), be prepared to try some of the most delicious local specialties. I`ll put fish as number one and say that trout is the most common and is always fresh because Herzegovina abounds in fish farms. Best thing to drink while eating fish is good vine and you can`t be in a better place for that, because Herzegovina has its own wine road. Some of the best autochthonous vines are Žilavka (white vine) and Blatina (red vine). Grape is also used to make Loza, spirit typical for Herzegovina. For those not drinking alcohol, there are homemade juices like elder juice, mint juice and juice from the roses ( juice made out of rose petals). But don`t leave without trying Herzegovina sack cheese (it is a cheese made from sheep, cow or goat milk, which matures in the sacks made of sheep skin), Livanjski sir (Livno cheese), japrak (grape leaves stuffed with meat and rice) and of course the inevitable Hercegovački prosciutto (it is air-dried uncooked ham, tasty but not salty, with strong notes of wood smoke).
After every good meal comes desert. And Bosnia and Herzegovina has excellent pastries. You have to try baklava (flaky pastry with a filling of nuts, drenched in sugar syrup ), hurmašica (date-shaped pastry drenched in a sweet syrup), kompot (a cold sweet drink made of cooked fruit), tufahija (whole stewed apple stuffed with a walnut filling), tulumba (deep-fried dough sweetened with syrup) and rahatlokum (confection based on a gel of starch and sugar).
I deliberately left out coffee. Because in Bosnia and Herzegovina it`s always time for coffee. Bosnian coffee is something you must try.
In the end I will say. “Come and taste Bosnia and Herzegovina.”Because I`m sure, after you try it once you`ll come back again.
Source: Travel Tips Bosnia and Herzegovina service