The Gjerkeš Estate

Youthfulness and the maturity of the wine cellar

The closest route is via Austria. There are no main roads. It’s quite possible that you’ll get lost. And no doubt you’ve never been there before, although Goricko is a landscape park and a natural gem that isn’t even far off the beaten track. The Gjerkeš Estate is a new culinary aim in Slovenia, with a taste of creativity and a well-known young team! Not even the scales remain of the trout, thanks in part to the Welschriesling wine, and the beetroot gnocchi are filled with horseradish cream that makes your mouth tingle.

Buckwheat pie with cream of porcini mushrooms and sauteed leeks. Toasted brioche with beef tartare, mustard seeds and chives. Langaš flatbread with a pumpkin seed oil emulsion topped with fried black pudding. The table is full of intricate bite-size treats that express the chef’s mastery; the ideas are varied and draw inspiration from local, Goričko ingredients and specialities. The young chef and his team (Matic Branda and Martina Zamuda) exhibit knowledge and seriousness, while presenting a story that is the reward of a trip to Goričko. If they weren’t so young, you’d think they were ‘crazy’… But that’s exactly why you know they will succeed!
Beetroot with peach gel, goat’s yoghurt and horseradish ice-cream. The trout, bought from a local supplier just over the border, is served amid a colourful company of textural surprises. Although not a single bone remains from the brook trout, there is still enough of the house Chardonnay for the sauce. The ravioli comes with duck, the pearl barley is served alongside Mangalica pork and chestnuts, the radish is filled with kajmak clotted cream, the lamb is served with elderberries in a terrine, and the venison is accompanied by sour cherries, so that you don’t forget that youngsters are cooking for you. There is nothing normal about Gjerkeš’s gibanica either; it features a walnut praline, curd cheese mousse, poppy seed ice-cream, and ‘biscuits’ from apples. When you can’t manage anymore, you are presented with a refreshing grapefruit and homemade gin sorbet, with dark chocolate, raspberries and meringue. So, you simply must, because that’s why you came to Goričko to experience a new, different and superb wine tasting experience with a tasting of the culinary future.