Smallest-best
First it was just a studio (in Maribor), and now it’s a house and a meadow (in Zgornja Polskava). But Miza za štiri, even though it now has three rooms, a terrace and a garden, is still our smallest restaurant (maximum 12 guests), or rather the smallest among the best!
Table for more
A table for four was always – for more. First of all, it was an experience, because it was in a studio apartment, in which Jure and Maja were constantly creating and hosting at their small dining table. Then it was an experience of aesthetic cuisine, which with its seasonal collections created the most beautiful Slovenian fine dining calendars. With the move from the city to the country, not only the kitchen grew and the number of tables tripled, but amateur cooking became professional, the self-taught chef became a famous chef, and his collections are no longer just dishes, but experiences.
Juices
The latest (2026) experience melts… But not only on the tongue, but even before; because it does not melt, but rather intensifies. This is the experience – of taste, which is first freshly squeezed, then frozen, then melted; like a free flow, which offers the best immediately and not later, first grand cru, then premier cru and finally (by village and regional) water.
Therefore, for a complete experience with the tasting menu, it is necessary to choose (also) a non-alcoholic accompaniment.
Juice
Why (also) non-alcoholic accompaniment, explains the essence of beetroot, which announces the first course as an aperitif. The frozen self-flow of beetroot, first (snail-like) pressed and seasoned, melted in parts because the water in the beetroot froze first, and the thick, which contains sugar and all other substances, all aromas and most of the taste, consequently melted first. Grand cru, the best beetroot, is thus a pure concentrate, the essence of its earthy-sweet and deep taste.
Beetroot
The ice that has not yet melted – because it has frozen below freezing – is just tasteless water, with just a little color to make the “plate” look pretty. On it is a baked beetroot tartar with lemon mayonnaise, pickled beetroot and chervil. The grand cru (the first quarter of the juice that melted) was the aperitif essence in the glass, the premier cru, the second quarter, enhanced the taste of the tartar, and with the third quarter the author pickled the beetroot.
Greeting
The greeting from the kitchen is therefore perfectly simple, as the true introduction to the new experience of the Miza za štiri follows only after it. A cube of brioche fried in butter, venison pâté, mushroom powder and raindrops chili. A cone filled with fresh cheese with paprika, pickled wild garlic bud, chervil.
Peas
The pea soup is delicately smoky and cold. But first, there’s the herb panna cotta and the creme fraiche ice cream, with baby pea shoots, trout roe and chives.
Sea bass
Fresh sea bass is marinated in herbs and citrus, one part is in slices, the other as a tartare with caper leaf oil. When Maja pours it with tarragon vinegar at the table, it floats on lemon cream, which warms it, and chili oil with piment d’Espelette, which warms us. As all this concentrates at the bottom into a refreshing sauce, there is a piece of homemade sourdough bread “for spreading” on it.
Cauliflower
No Miza za štiri collection is complete without two ingredients, beetroot and cauliflower. The immediacy (essence) of the first is answered by the second with its breadth and depth, like roasted and charred, like couscous made from tiny flowers, like a sauce and as a coexistence that emphasizes the umami with hazelnuts, in cream and roasted, and with butter, concentrated browned and curry-aromatic. Classic, but always different.
Trout
Spinach cappelletti are filled with young cheese and smoked trout, with pieces of smoked trout in between, topped with a cream of roasted fennel and a fish/trout butter sauce. The “link”, the connecting link to the accompaniment in the glass, is a pickled apple. It turns a feast for the eyes into a feast for the tongue.
Tomato
For refreshment before a walk on the lawn in front of the house, where the chef has already blown the charcoal embers on the grill, there is a tomato salad. In a martini glass, there is a clear tomato essence pickled with drops of pumpkin oil and cherry tomatoes cooked (confited) in oil.
Potato
Childhood potato memory. The potatoes are boiled first then fried in beer batter, and finally heated over charcoal. The childhood nostalgia is pleasant, while the chef’s is almost liquid, still very hot and concentrated potato-like center. Once a cheap margarine, today the accompaniment is concentrated fat sweet cream, which was first frozen in the same way as juices, and when melted, it separated into water, which made pea soup, and thickened cream, as thick as whipped cream.
Duck 1
Next comes the duck trilogy. The first part is a tribute to the duck, its best part. Duck breast, lightly browned in a pan and finished on the grill. Accompanied by caramelized-roasted carrots and a sauce made from carrot grand cru juice with duck juice, jus.
Duck 2
The second part of the duck is the most prestigious. Foie gras with Jerusalem artichoke cream, cranberry jam and cranberry sauce. The fat that has become concentrated in the duck’s liver melts in the glass.
Duck 3
The third part is the homeliness of the duck. Confit of duck leg is fried like a donut, with pickled cucumber and a light salad of microgreens, it is both fine and fast at the same time.
After the duck
The duck trilogy is finished off with carrot sorbet with salt flower and chervil. After the grand cru, the premier was also usefully used.
Apricots
When the author returns to his roots, he also remembers the drinks of his childhood. Back then, it was thick apricot juice with sweet cream on a straw, but now it’s thick apricot mousse in firm balls on a spoon, with apricot jam, black sponge cake, black cocoa sponge, roasted hazelnut crumbles and apricot sorbet.
Petit fours
Sometimes sour milk with buckwheat porridge, now a sour milk ball on buckwheat groats. Apple strudel everywhere, only here a fried dough balls stuffed with caramelized apples. And a completely different tarragon potica, like tarragon mousse on a white chocolate brownie, blondie.
Non-alcoholic accompaniment
Beetroot: beetroot juice, green apple, citric acid. Peas and trout: cuvee of different green apple essences, pea essence, a little chives and milk proteins from fermented cream. Marinated sea bass: green apple, celery, tarragon, a pinch of salt, lime zest. Cauliflower: grapes, green apple, carrot essence, lemon verbena. Spinach capelletti: grapes, celery, fennel, salt. Duck: premier cru carrot juice, grapes, celery. Apricots: grapes, apricot cuvee and basil essence.
Wine pairing
Aperitif: Brut nature 2017, Fedora. Beetroot: Pinot Gris 2025, Herga. Peas and trout: Šipon 7 Numbers 2023, Puklavec Familiy wines. Marinated sea bass: Sauvignon 2018, M-simply good wines. Cauliflower: Malvasia orange 2020, Vina Čuk. Spinach capelletti: Rhine Riesling M 2018, Dveri-Pax. Duck: La Vita Lucente 2023, Toskana. Dessert: Traminer 2013, dry, Šturm.
