Montenegro's Best Beaches

In seaside Montenegro, it's rare to find a place where swimsuits aren't appropriate attire.  In restaurants, bars, at crosswalks and in cars, in supermarkets and boutiques, everyone wears them.  Budva is a city where the bikini is the default dresscode, where people walk on the sidewalk in trunks, carrying their shopping.  One half expects to see lifeguards set out as traffic police.
Montenegro might seem like a beach lover's paradise - it has the blue water of the Adriatic, dramatic coves, lots of sun, bountiful seafood and throngs of young people.  But, to tell the truth, it can be a little difficult finding a good spot to lie down by the shore.  Most of the coast is too rocky and cliffy, a lot of the best beaches are overdeveloped and over-packed.  To find a perfect idyl takes some time and patience.
We traveled much of the short seashore, but obviously didn't make it to every stretch of sand - here, though, are our favorite Montenegrin beaches.

Sveti Stefan is one of Montenegro's most iconic sights, a little protrusion of red tile and white stone jutting out into the warm water.  The beach here is sandy, protected and kept very clean - apparently.  We never set foot on it, though we passed it every day for nearly a week. It's impossible not to include, though, because of how pretty it is, and how majestic is the setting.
Unfortunately, the parking situation is a nightmare and we were deterred by both the other drivers and the extremely hazardous turnoff.

For a few days, we bought our milk and yogurt in Petrovac, at a grocery store full of sunburned families in flip flops.  It's a family resort, with a promenade full of strollers and more sunblock than tanning lotion.  Petrovac also has one of the most scenic town beaches, with rocky isles just beyond the bay and high-sided bluffs set on either side.  The sand is reddish and fine, there are lots of appetizing cafes the water is clear.

A very foreign concept to most Americans is the idea of renting a beach umbrella and loungers - but it's the default way for European sun seekers to set up camp by the shore.  At home, we either bring an umbrella or go without shade, and tend to lie on towels.  Here in Montenegro it's possible to lie by yourself, but it's seen as somehow cheating.  Most people pay the few euros for shelter and comfort.

Down beneath rows of kebab stands and backed by minarets, Ulcinj's Mala Plaza has a distinctly Albanian feel.  This close to the border the music changes to more warbled tones, the language landscape shifts and the visitors are almost all from Kosovo and Albania.  Ulcinj has its own energy, a cultural hedonism mixing Islam and bikinis, halal and beer.  The remains of an old castle buttress one side of the beach, the sand is pleasant, the vibe is more boisterous than other Montenegrin beaches.

Tiny, beautiful Rose (pronounced like the wine) is at the remote tip of the Luštica peninsula, jutting out into glass-clear waters and more in touch with the sea.  We stayed the night here, eating great seafood at a waterside konoba and smelling the fresh wind off the open water.  In the country, it's known as a somewhat glamorous locale, but it's not big enough to get overrun.  Diving from the pier into the water is like finding a pocket of heavy, cold atmosphere - the light from the surface dances on the deep rocks, one can see fish darting in the depths.
The only problem is that there's no real "beach."  People lie and swim from the concrete platforms, in a way that reminded us of nearby Croatia.  Tanning on concrete feels like a more extreme form of intake, as though the sun is hardened as it strikes and ricochets from the plane. Where there's no sand or pebbly wash, this is what one has to make do with.

Far away from the sea, in water much calmer and environs less visited, the beach at Murici, on Lake Skadar, felt like a refuge.  Fishermen docked their boats there and the pace was as slow as the days were long.  The light faded gradually from the sky in the evening, leaving us feeling drained and peacefully silent.  Sleeping here is limited to camping or bungalows, the resorts of the coast feel like a different concept of "waterside."
We loved the beach, though it's gravel (to be truthful) and the water is shallow for a very long ways.  It's a sliver of hospitable shore in a landscape dominated by cliff and rock, algae and weeds.  The freshwater swims we took felt luxurious after so much Mediterranean salt.

The most prototypically "perfect" beach in Montenegro is almost certainly Przno beach - not the oiled up, hyper-touristy strip in Budva with the same name, but a different Przno.  Tucked away in the last, wild bay before the Gulf of Kotor, it's visited mostly by Montenegrins in the know and adventurous tourists with their own car.
Here, the water is very shallow for a long way, but the powdery, white sand and calm ripples make it worth the effort spent wading.  Because the beach is so sheltered and the water is so easygoing, it's a popular place for families with young children.  There are picnic tables in the woods around, and a shady, open-air restaurant tucked into the fig trees behind.  Przno is the kind of tropical beach that would be loved anywhere, from the Caribbean to the South Pacific - the shallow, aquamarine water and soft sand feel familiar in a postcard way, the view is of gentle lines, the umbrellas are (at least) well spaced.

Swimming at Drobni Pijesak, looking back towards the mountains and scrub, one can truly feel that they are somewhere remote.  It's one of the few nice beaches in Montenegro that doesn't yet have a forest of condominiums behind it, and it's hard enough to get to that it remains mostly uncrowded.
With white pebbles and a verdant frame, Drobni Pijesak is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful on the coast, but there is very limited parking nearby the water, so most have to walk a precipitous path down from the main road.  It's a trek steep and long enough - about twenty minutes - to keep away the crowds, and there's a nice little cafe tucked into one corner.

Down a long walkway that begins amid stone walls, passes through thick oleanders and then weaves under pine boughs, our favorite beach was also the harshest textured.  The little strip of rock and pebble hidden below Rijeka Rezevici isn't perfect to lie on, but it is a wonderful place to sit, swim and eat.
The water here is full of boulders that hide schools of minnows, quick bream and mullet.  There are hundreds of sea urchins, too, and an altogether wild feel that makes this little cove feel exciting.  It's the world of shipwrecks and skinned knees, of a secret pocket of Adriatic life.  The water is wavy and redolent of salt, there are rarely more than twenty people.

At Balun restaurant, tucked just above Rijeka Rezevici's beach, we ate expertly cooked meals of fresh seafood and fresher vegetables.  Approaching the restaurant, the trail through the woods enters Balun's vegetable garden: vines hung with tomatoes and dusky peppers, rows of lettuces, stone-edged plots of roots.  Our affable waiter told us that they employ one man solely to haul all of the rest of their ingredients (and alcohol) down to the water every evening - and to trudge back up with the trash.  It's a steep, fifteen-minute hike.  "Strong legs," the waiter said.
We ate silky cuttlefish risotto one night and a melange of grilled squid, octopus and carrot during another sunset.  The tables are painted wood, set out under the stars.  There are paintings hung on trees.  The sun's last blazes are especially vibrant here.  The clientele is always excited - it feels magical to have found this place, this beach.  It's so isolated and thrilling, a piece of the Adriatic where the breeze and the bobbing boats inspire energy instead of sloth.  

A Softer, Quieter Coast

After more than a week of swimming in the salty, rocky Adriatic, Lake Skadar was especially cool and soft.  The beach was muck-bottomed, the surface was calm, the air smelled of trees and earth. The only ripples I heard were my own. It felt as though all the roughness of the world had been smoothed and melted into silt and lakewater.
Those who think of Montenegrin water will surely think of the Mediterranean, but there is another place where boats set out in the mornings and fish jump for flies. Lake Skadar is a quieter, but no less majestic, second coast.  In the more trafficked end, boats cut lines into the lilypads and algae.

Filled by the mountain river Morača, Skadar retains something alpine, even as it lies so close to the sea.  The surface is punctuated with islands and little watercraft.  Beyond the water, in the blue-hued distance, are the peaks of Albania.
The lake is actually shared between the two countries (it's called Shkodër on the other side), with a zig-zag border that cuts down the middle.  Skadar is the largest lake in southern Europe, with a fluctuating surface area of about 170 square miles.  It feels even bigger, maybe because of how exaggerated the mountain shoreline is, or because of how it's positioned: the lake is elongated from east to west, so the sun travels from one end to the other, appearing and disappearing over the water's edge.

At the little pebbly beach in Murici, cows and donkeys nosed through piles of burnt trash and small camper vans stood in the shade.  The place felt like the end of the earth, with nothing but lakewater to look at and sheer mountains behind.  Murici, the town, is a tiny place with a little mosque and steep streets.  In the mornings, a grocery van came to town - old women in headscarves crowded around to buy flour or dish soap.
We slept here, near the beach, in a bungalow that smelled of new pine lumber and bugspray.  There was an open air restaurant, where the people in the campground could eat fried fish or greasy ćevapi.

At "Jezero" restaurant, on the more populated side of Skadar, we feasted on pickled trout and baked eel.  Tour boats docked and puttered around the pier below the restaurant's terrace.  Groups of people were led down to the boats, then motored far out into the distance, where we lost sight of them among the islands.  Groups came back to shore very tan.  The boat touts worked the parking lot relentlessly, waving brochures and spinning tales of private beaches and secret coves.  The meal was too large for us, we retreated to the car full of fish and feeling sleepy.

The western reaches of Skadar dissolve into a marshy, weedy wetland full of waterlilies and eel traps.  There are a few villages here, where shallow fishing boats are pulled up to firm land and women sell live carp on the roadsides.  It's a destitute part of the country, far removed from the development of the coast.  The people are different too, with harder-set mouths and more clothes.

Here, the cultural landscape is tinged by nearby Albania more than by Serbia or Croatia.  The signs are in Shqip, the people are Muslim.
In Murici, we watched a round, older woman wash clothes on the beach, boiling the cloth over a woodfire and then beating the wet clumps on the pebbles.  Further along the pebbled shore, some children swam and a few tourists shared a bottle of wine.  We swam in the evening and listened to the laughing conversation of a Czech rally-racing team.  During our morning dip, we saw that a white-haired German couple had slept right out on the beach.  It was uncrowded and calm there; we all kept our distance from one another, sharing the view and the quiet.

It's difficult to tell, in some places, where the earth begins and the water ends - green fields blend into algae and weeds.  In other parts of coast, the white rock of the mountains slices directly into the surface.  The drive around the lake's edge is a wonder. The road is narrow and crooked, the drops are frightening, there are few guardrails.  One is rewarded with a changing, deserted vista that is wilder and more dramatic than almost anywhere else in the Balkans.
The whole Montenegrin coast of Skadar, and much of the Albanian side as well, has been protected as a national park.  It's a paradise for birds - we watched herons fishing in the evening and pygmy cormorants sunning themselves in the morning light.  Some of the last pelicans in Europe live here, though we didn't see any.
The speck out in the bay is the remaining heap of rocks from tiny Grmožur fortress.

Watching the light fade over the lake's waters, our thoughts were drawn to the blaring music and eternal swimsuits of the coast.  This is a part of Montenegro that feels cut off from the rest, a place where peacefulness reigns.
Interestingly, it is more purely an amalgamation of mountains and water - what this country is famous for- than the famed resorts of Budva or Kotor.  Here, one can slip into the otherworldly more easily.  Swimming and staggering in the salty hotspots: abrasive.  Wading and succumbing in the fresh water: soothing, silent, a dip into the distant and unknown.

Gypsy Kitchens: Njeguški Fruit Salad

The roadside stalls changed dramatically as we reached sea-level again, driving down the mountain from Njeguši.  The men and women selling Njeguški cheese and smoked ham hocks were replaced by ones sitting beside and almost eclipsed by huge piles of watermelons and cantaloupes. This gave us an idea.  In Montenegro, anything termed "Njeguški" on a menu is either draped, stuffed or smothered with the village's famous sir and pršut.  We knew we wanted to make [blank] Njeguški with the ham and cheese just procured in the village, but we didn't know what.  Until those sweet orbs met us back on the coast.

Pršut and sir have a happy marriage in this country.  Rarely does the first make an appearance without the second on its arm.  They seem like an odd pairing, from different animals, one smelling of smoke and the other delicately aged.  Finding the perfect third element to Njeguški-ize, seemed a little tricky.  Seeing those cantaloupes on the roadside reminded us that in Italy, America and the world over, the favored bedfellow of prosciutto is melon.  Cheese and melon seemed like they may clash, but we were willing to see how the three all got along.

To bridge the cantaloupe-cheese gap, we added in some red onion, fresh parsley and hulled sunflower seeds.  All three of those ingredients are extremely popular in Montenegro and around.  Our sunflower seeds were roasted with salt, which allowed us to skip salting the salad itself.  Between them, the pršut and the cheese, there was plenty of tasty sodium to go around.  The melon acted as a wonderful accompaniment to each version of saltiness, rounding them out while holding its flavorful own in the mix.

To further incorporate all the ingredients, we dressed the mix of squared melon pieces, leafed parsley, strips of pršut and cubed cheese with apple cider vinegar and a drizzle of olive oil.  We did this before adding the sunflower seeds so that they would stick instead of just falling through the cracks to the bottom of the bowl.  Since it was a little tricky to get all ingredients in/on one forkful, we were able to see just how different combinations within the recipe worked.  Melon and cheese - particularly this aged, hard, dryer cheese - do go well together, especially with the onion and parsley mixed in.  Any bite with red onion was better and any with pršut was the best.  The smokiness and marbled fat worked with every other flavor involved.  Luckily, cut super thin and ripped into short strips, it was well incorporated throughout the whole salad.

Being as we're already bridging the savory/sweet salad gap, we feel confident saying that this Njeguški fruit salad can also feature in a meal as a side dish, not just an appetizer or dessert.  It would make a heavenly garnish to a main of grilled shrimp.  We can definitely see it working wonderfully aside eggs at a brunch.  Basically, anything that goes well with prosciutto, cheese or melon goes even better with prosciutto, cheese and melon.  It is much too hot to think of melting cheese or stuffing any meat with some more meat (as is the case with Njeguški ražanj - spit roasted meat stuffed with pršut and sir).  So, finding a refreshing way to use these two fine ingredients, purchased from the village itself, was wonderful.  It's also, quite simply, a great alternative to the standard sliced prosciutto and melon on a plate.

Njeguški Fruit Salad

Ingredients:
All quantities depend on how much you want to make. As a rough guide, we'd say equal parts prosciutto and cheese, equal parts sunflower seeds, red onion, parsley. A good melon base and the oil and vinegar to taste.
- cantaloupe
- Njeguški pršut  (or any thin-sliced smoked ham like Italian prosciutto or  Spanish jambon)
- Njeguški sir (or any hard, but cube-able, dryer cheese like an aged cheddar or asiago)
- red onion, diced
- fresh curly parsley, leafed
- sunflower seeds, hulled, preferably dry-roasted & salted
- olive oil
- apple cider vinegar


Method
- Choose your melon carefully by whatever method your parents (or some tv chef) taught you.  Fragrant is good.  Cube into fairly large pieces, about the size of ice cubes.
- Cut your ham into strips.  If kitchen shears aren't available, as they weren't for us, pull apart along the lines of fat.  This works just as well and hands are a little easier to clean than kitchen shears.
- Place your cut up melon into a large mixing bowl and add in your cubed cheese, strips of pršut, diced red onion and parsley.  Always good to work biggest ingredients to smallest when making a salad.  That way, you can really gauge your proportions.
- Coat with apple cider vinegar and drizzle with olive oil.  Mix with your hands.
- Sprinkle sunflower seeds over the top and then mix again.  Add a few more seeds to the top before serving.
- Refrigerate if not serving immediately.

Check out all of our recipes.

Montenegro's Churches in July

We've fallen into a lazy rhythm here in Montenegro, of soaking in the sun and expelling the heat back into the starry evenings.  This is a place to swim and walk slowly, and to look at things with the uncritical eye of a tourist.  What can we do in such a beautiful place but enjoy ourselves?  It's hard to react to this place with anything but stupor.  It's too hot and pleasant for anything else.
So, making our circuits around and above the shore, moving inland into the mountains and greener land, we've talked about little and noticed mostly colors and smells.  One of the things that stands out has been the meshing of architecture and rock, and the way the colorful light washes over it all.  The Cathedral of St. Tryphon is Kotor town's most picturesque church.  Built in 1166, it was damaged by an earthquake in the seventeenth century - it got its cockeyed look from the rebuilding process.  The towers don't quite match, the facade is handsomely asymmetrical, the setting is remarkable.  It's one of only two Catholic churches in Montenegro.

In the rocks and yellow grass above Kotor, one of Montenegro's most evocative buildings stands sentinel.  Looking out over the bay, built almost flush with the cliffs around it, the Church of Our Lady of Remedy isn't very big, but it's steeple punctuates the view perfectly.  This is the stuff of postcards and guidebook covers, the kind of chapel built less for worship than inspiration.

Around the bay to the northwest, past patches of hollyhock and flowering orange trees, is one of the largest religious buildings in the Adriatic, the not-really-that-big Birth of Our Lady church in Prčanj.  It's a pretty, blue-bordered church in a small cluster of roof tiles and bathing platforms. It's not nearly as large as one might think it would be, though it did take over 120 years to build. This side of the bay is less built up and has many beautiful, old stone houses on the waterfront. The calm waters there are never roused into more than a quiet lapping, the shallow spots are full of families swimming and playing together.

Up close, the church is almost overpowered by the lascivious blossoms of dozens of oleanders. Old couples stood on their porches in the close environs, fanning themselves and watching us carefully.  The tourists that come to Prčanj are almost all looking for a sunbed or a grilled fish - on the steps of the church, a few surprised men sipped beer and waved to us guiltily.  The place has the air of a forgotten, tropical mission, faded by the sun and just a few years from succumbing to the weeds and salt-air.

In a high, craggy valley, where the sunlight seemed collected as though in a bowl, we came to this grass-roofed, abandoned chapel.  Not far from the water, yet still at an extreme remove, the place had the emptiness of a dessert.  In the rocks around, a few horses and mules stood in what shade they could find, too hot to graze, their necks bent under the strain of July.  A crude wire hook held closed a gate across the church's doorway.

Inside we found a wooden ladder and wheelbarrow.  Also, a much-crumbled stone altar and the remnants of once-blue frescoes on the ceiling.  It was shady and cool, a tiny crossed knave. There were a few cigarette buts on the floor, but no beer cans.  The place was more cave than church, a tiny refuge beside the "ladder of cattaro," an ancient trading route now reduced to an outline in the scrub.

Montenegro's capital, Podgorica, is a spread-out place on a high plateau, far inland.  We talked to one woman from there who said that everyone leaves in the summer - it's too hot, too dusty, too dry.  The city streets were fully blanketed by a mid-summer quiet when we passed through.  This man and a robed priest were forking hay nearby the Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ. Around them were battered dumpsters and parked cars, a kind of meshing of agriculture and urban blight.  The church, built in 1993, looked more like a municipal building than anything - like a police station set down on the edge of town and given a dome.

Looking like something found at low tide on a barnacled rock, Holy Sunday Church is a tiny speck off the coast near Petrovac.  It was built, some say, by a Greek fisherman who was shipwrecked there and believed that his survival was a miracle.  From beneath a beach umbrella on the shore, the church blends in the with the rock below it.  From the coastal road, it's a little red-roofed speck. Seagulls and sailboats whorled around it, the Adriatic was impossibly blue.

The Rich Waters of Montenegro

Well, let's start with the present, actually.  On the Bay of Kotor, masts shoot into the sky, another layer in the breathtaking sundown silhouette.   It's a little like looking out at a forest in the winter, bare of leaves, offering views out at the sky and mountains beyond.   Montenegro may be named for its most famous mountain, but its name has been newly defined as 'a stretch of Adriatic coast.'  How could we not visit the Maritime Museum in a place like this?

I'm a fan of maritime museums, filled with anchors and model ships, old maps and navigation instruments.  There is something always so familiar about them, elements that carry over whether they are in Cape Cod, the South of France or former Yugoslavia.  It only makes sense that life at sea would have a a universal sameness, a blurring of borders.  One big difference between maritime museums place to place is the location in which they've been set up.  It's always very telling.  In Paimpol, the Musée de la Mer was housed in a former cod-drying factory - apropos to their particular seafaring history.  The Maritime Museum in Kotor is appropriately housed in an old mansion.

The naval history of this country, with its prized Bay and Adriatic coast is undeniably intriguing.  Its history, separate from inland Montenegro due to the fact that it changed hands oh so many times, has given the coast (especially the Bay of Kotor) a unique cultural identity.  But there's another angle that's hard to ignore.  There's the naval, cultural, geographic and political importance.  But there's also the economic.  The past, present and future of Montenegrin maritime as inextricably tied to wealth.

The Maritime Museum here is noticeably devoid of any photos of plucky fishermen.  Is it bad that I hear "maritime" and think of striped-shirted sailors singing songs and drinking out of mugs?  (Yes, essentially Popeye.  For Merlin, 'maritime' means 'naval,' which is a more intellectual definition, but equally incomplete).  The interior and exhibitions in this gorgeous 18th century mansion feel very noble, refined.  High society.  The walls are decorated with paintings of battles and famous sailings, done by the most acclaimed sea-painters of the day.  There are guns inlaid with mother of pearl, used to fend off pirates, and complete drawing room sets from other wealthy families from the coastal towns of Prcanj and Resin.

The large-scale model ships, some coming up as high as my shoulders, were the most amazing pieces in the museum. The grand, well-crafted boats easily outshone the dozens of military models in glass cases.  Outside the museum, beautiful boats pulled up, as pristine and lovely. Each one, set side by side, modeled a different look. People posed for pictures beside this yacht, which had hung a sort of battle flag for the Wimbledon Men's Final that was going on. St. George's flag, flown during English sporting events, supported Andy Murray (a Brit) in his war against Roger Federer (the eventual victor). I couldn't tell you which boat felt more real to me, the 4ft tall model from centuries ago or the yacht with classic Titanic-like smokestacks. They both were sort of surreal.

The economy of Montenegro is not strong.  It's a poorer country than one would think gazing at the yachts and looking at hotel prices in Budva.  Almost all development in the country since its independence in 2006 has been focused on the capital and the coast.  Poverty can be mapped out pretty much according to elevation on a map of the country. Higher you get, higher the economic strife.  At sea level, people are the most well off, and the prosperity declines as you move north, away from the coast and up into the mountains.  The United Nations estimates that somewhere between 45 - 60% of the nation's poverty exists in the Northern mountain region, as far from the coast as you can get, in the places we could see from our doorstep in Valbonë, Albania and Rekë e Allagës, Kosovo.

In 2008, Montenegro received more foreign investment than any other country in Europe.  Most of the billions came from Russia and were centered on Budva.  The global financial crisis has obviously affected international spending and Montenegro's economy has taken a big hit.  Still, there are certain projects that are continuing - including the ongoing development of Porto Montenegro in Tivat, on the Bay.  It's a superyacht super playground that has the mission of transforming Montenegro into "the next Monaco."  Being as the personal income tax rate was just lowered to 9% and any investment of (only) half a million euros or more buys you Montenegrin citizenship, Monaco-like status may be more within reach than one would think.

Port Montenegro took an old naval shipyard named Arsenal, cleaned and snazzied it up and turned it into the best fight Montenegro may have for forging its way into the economic future.  In Kotor, the superyachts dock for a little less and have to make due without golf courses, shopping malls and luxury hotels right on shore.  This is more like a parking lot with a stellar view. From 1955 through 2000, the Bay was filled with a different sort of large boat. Jugooceanija, a wildly successful shipping company essentially owned this water until corruption charges brought it down, taking hundreds of local jobs with it. Tourism has helped to employ some of those people again.  Above, local children play on what may or may not be a relic of those days. 

Portraits of the richest shipowners of the 18th and 19th centuries line the hallway of the Maritime Museum.  These men were from Russia, Austria, Italy, all places that had control of the Bay at one point or another.  Nowadays, men and women from Russia, England, America and wherever else sit for dinner at Galleon Restaurant.  It is a wonderful restaurant and its yacht-owner draw is easy to see.  It is upmarket, fancy by Kotor standards and offers incredible views of the diners' babies sitting pretty out on the glistening bay.  A view out over modern Montenegrin maritime - in line with tradition, in a lot of ways.

Gypsy Kitchens: After-Beach Blitva (or, Lime Basil Potato Salad)

These are the kind of meals accompanied by the smell of salt water and the slanting, still-warm sunlight of high summer.  It's the kind of meal to eat in a swimsuit, with dripping hair, in a group of friends.  There is a reason to envy the people of the Balkans, who have Montenegro as a playground.  It's not the beaches - everywhere there are beaches.  It's not the sticky bars or sunburns, the mosquitos or busloads of Russians.  No, the reason to envy is the seafood; simple, charred and slicked with olive oil.
There is a part of the Adriatic seaside where grilled squid are as common as seashells, baby red snapper appear crisped by the plateful and octopus tentacles make knots on every table.  From Croatia down through Montenegro and into northern Albania, the seafood is generally the same - shrimp, cephalopod, grilled fish; all very simple, all served with not much more than a slice of lemon and a pile of blitva.

Blitva is boiled by the potful in every restaurant in the region.  Essentially, this is a dish of garlic, chard and potato, cooked together and drizzled with olive oil.  It's great, it's filling, and it can get kind of boring.  This is our second blitva July, and, after a week spent hugging the mediterranean and eating lots of seafood, we were ready to dress up the recipe a little.  Our version was made for a Montenegrin evening spent cooking out on our rental balcony, using a tiny hotplate, watching the sun set as some little sprat-like fish sputtered and sizzled in the pan.  What we wanted from a side dish was: bright and herbal flavors, a bit of a tropical feel and (really) something different.  So, here's our experiment, a potato salad with basil and lime that we've named "after beach blitva."

We experimented with blitva last summer, in the sweltering seaside resort of Opatija - there, we put it on a plate with cous-cous stuffed squid, standing around a barbecue with some family and drinking lots of strong liquor.  That time, we cooked carrot and red onion in with the standard chard and potatoes.
By rights, this latest version shouldn't be called blitva at all, because the name actually means "chard," which there is none of here.  Calling a potato salad by another name is fine, but calling something chard when it's not… well, it's a liberal definition.

Here are the familiar elements: boiled potato and garlic.
Here are our deviations: lime (juiced), celery root (chopped and raw), red onion and - the biggest transgretion - fresh basil instead of chard.  None of it was cooked, except for the little boiling potatoes, and we also mixed and served the ingredients cold, so that they'd stay fresher-tasting and snappier.  The onion and celeriac add a little texture and crunch, the basil adds flavor and greenery, the lime gives it a very bright note - what a success!

This is a recipe to futz around with, not to let lie, so here are some of our ideas for the brave: mustard would have been good added to the dressing, or some other spice, like chili paste, sambal oelek or horseradish.  Ginger could give it more flavor, and cilantro would be an easy addition.  Chili oil could be substituted for some or all of the olive oil.
As it stood, the easy play between starch, lime, garlic and basil was enough for our plates, and was cool comfort beside our fried fish and sea breeze.

Like all potato salads, the most difficult part is cleaning and cooking the potatoes, which isn't difficult at all.  We kept the skins on - the cardboard box we'd picked them out of at the market was a mix of colors.  After cooking, we let the potatoes cool to room temperature so that the basil wouldn't wilt.
For the dressing, use three ripe limes (the brighter green a lime is, the more un-ripe it is, some yellow is a good thing), olive oil and salt, plus whatever spices or other flavors you're going to add.  We mixed the garlic and chopped onion in with the oil so it would incorporate better, but otherwise kept it simple.

Here is the recipe, to be used as a base for greater things or to be followed for a simple, summery, seaside accompaniment:

After Beach Blitva or Lime Basil Potato Salad
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 lbs. small, boiling potatoes, well-scrubbed and cubed.
- 1 celery root, peeled and roughly matchsticked
- 1 medium-sized red onion
- 3 cups fresh basil
- 3 ripe limes
- 3/4 cups olive oil
- 2 or 3 large cloves garlic, crushed and minced
- salt


Method
- Clean the potatoes, cut into one inch (really, about 3/4 inch) cubes, boil in salted water until tender. Drain and let cool.
- In a large bowl, mix together oil, juice from all limes, garlic, onion and some more salt.
- Add potatoes, basil and celery root, mix all ingredients well.
- Serve cool alongside simple fish, cephalopod or crustacean.

 

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