Fine dining is more than food on a plate. It’s a whole experience and a specific mood which food, restaurant, location, staff, preparation method and details you thought were not that important, offer. Maybe they don’t suit every pocket, but service in such restaurants usually goes far beyond their prices.
The concept of fine dining itself goes back to times after the French Revolution and it is connected to Paris, of course. Luxury and perfection are the main characteristics of such restaurants, while the selection of dishes itself has no connection to any particular national cuisine. Do you have an aversion to small portions in big plates which cost a fortune and whose names you can hardly pronounce? Don’t give up, in fine dining restaurants you can certainly find something with familiar flavours prepared in a different way. Therefore, if you are ready for a gastro-adventure over restaurant menus, the following text might help you.
Zak
📌 Centre
The restaurant with tradition that started under the same name in Šafarikova Street, is now located in the exclusive boutique hotel in Novi Sad. Restaurant’s lavish ambience suggests that it is not an ordinary restaurant, which can make you think you don’t have enough money in your wallet for this type of pleasure. Although the prices are slightly higher, they are not exorbitant in comparison to other restaurants. Having in mind that the menu includes wild fish and meat from high mountain pastures, with some exotic side dishes, it seems that everything is allowed on Zak’s plate – if it’s of high quality, has an unusual name and flavour and is served carefully.
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Some of the specialities are dry-aged beef which includes a 45-day preparation, sea bass, octopus, pork tenderloins, duck breasts with celery root purée, etc., while after the main course you’ll have the same unusual dessert such as the green tea ice cream. For wine lovers, Zak is a small paradise, since there are over two hundred premium local and international wines.
Bistro La Mer
A Novi Sad restaurant with the French idea, located at the corner of Car Lazar Boulevard and Đorđa Servickog Street, is not just a restaurant, but a wine bar and a shop as well. Hardly anybody believed in the making of the essential concept of La Mer, which, according to the restaurant owner, includes comfortable ambience, a varied menu with over 160 different wines, and all that comes with smooth jazz.
Envisaged as the place that gathers hedonists in the true sense of the word – poets, artists and intellectuals, Bistro La Mer is an oasis of good flavours outside the city centre. You can expect dry-aged rump steak, pork chops, pasta and risotto, even a beef burger, dried within a month. You can also opt for fresh fish and other specialities in consultation with the waiter. You can find out many things about wine and master the terminology (in case you don’t know, wine can be lively, fat, mulled, burnt, and flabby) at the La Mer website, thus we advise you to check it out before visiting the restaurant.
Cubo
The Cubo concept restaurant is located near the Danube, outside the hustle and bustle of the city, among high trees and beautiful branches. The prefix refers to a bit different atmosphere you will experience in the restaurant. Everything is put together very carefully, including the ambience, menu, wine card and service as well as the subtle music programme you can enjoy while eating. If you haven’t heard that the restaurant has a ‘music director’, you have probably heard about Aleksandar Dujin, who has that role in this very restaurant.
The menu is based on unusual flavours such as stuffed quail with cranberry sauce or rump steak in chokeberry sauce, and delicacies such as chicken liver mousse with Oxford sauce. You can also find numerous high-quality local wines, sorted by type. Due to its specific cosy ambience, a small one-day festival is being organised in the Cubo garden each September, when 17 wineries present themselves and their products, accompanied with a special menu of the day.
Project 72 wine&deli
Details – the first impression when you enter Project 72 Wine&Deli, which is anything but your typical restaurant. Well-known Novi Sad artists were in charge of the interior, while more than welcoming staff is in charge of plates, after master chefs prepare them, of course. Project 72 revived forgotten dishes in a creative way, in mostly small portions, after which you won’t be able to breathe.
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You cannot just drop by the restaurant in a hurry. You have to sit down and enjoy everything. Local artists, painters, actors and chefs often come here to take an extraordinary bite made of organic groceries and a sip (or more) of some of 140 wines. You can find well-known specialities with unknown ingredients on the menu and vice versa. However, even if you recognise only one word in the menu – you can hardly make a mistake. Chutney ice-cream, veal tongue, bull’s tail with celery root purée, venison kebab, smoked tuna, camomile and honey cream – it’s up to you. The restaurant made it onto the Best Restaurant Guru list in 2019, so checking why the world knows the flavours of the Project 72 wouldn’t go amiss. You can take a virtual tour of the object bristling with details on the restaurant website, but we advise you not to stick to that impression only.
G.imi
📌 Centre
Relatively young, G.imi has quickly become popular among the citizens of Novi Sad due to the unusual menu and interior which combines various modern and classical elements. At first, the restaurant was based on Russian and Georgian cuisine, and then it expanded its menu, while the contemporary method of preparation and appearance of plating haven’t changed.
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For a while, your Instagram profile was probably swamped with black burgers that had to be eaten wearing gloves. Local and international dishes vary between Mangalica salami and cow’s milk cheese, French stew with mashed apples and cauliflower gratin, duck legs with parsnip purée and lavender sauce. At the end of your meal, you can have the famous traditional cream pie. When it comes to wines, there’s a sommelier who devoted himself to harvesting and regions of our country, maintaining the balance with the varied restaurant menu, which, we believe, wasn’t easy.
Agape Villa
📌 Centre
Agape Villa, located in the city centre, but still cosy and hidden, offers an experience a sense ahead, as saying goes. Agape has all characteristics of the best fine dining restaurants: extraordinary food, best wines, peaceful ambience and great service as well as hidden corners such as VIP hall or wine cellar that offer privacy and exclusivity, making this place unique.
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The restaurant menu includes national specialities prepared in an innovative way. It is not easy to make a choice from their menu, but if you ask the chef, he would recommend steaks, ham hocks and ribs, i.e. meat dishes that are being prepared for 48 hours, according to his special recipe. However, the wine cellar always leaves visitors breathless. The wines of Fruška Gora and international wines are within your grasp – perfect for those who are in search of a typical Novi Sad night out with wine and tambouritza players.
Author: Leona Pap
