A rather outstanding wine from a rather unlikely source – the restaurant wine find of the summer so far.
This is beginning to turn into a wine blog… but I have to tell you about a very nice bottle I have recently discovered in Jelsa. So nice in fact that I still cannot quite believe that it comes from Macedonia. No disrespect to the Macedonians, but I didn’t think they produced wine this good.
One of the most underrated restaurants on Hvar is Pizzeria Jelsa, which is the other half of Eis Caffe Jelsa on the corner of the main square. Having established themselves as the best ice cream on Hvar (not just my opinion), the Eis Caffe team moved into the restaurant business a couple of years ago, with excellent results.
Gorgeous fresh salads (don’t miss the gorgonzola and pear salad) and excellent pasta (ask for the fiery spaghetti) are stand out choices on a thoughtful menu which offers more than excellent pizza, but the real story is the exceptional wine at an affordable price.
I was seduced on a previous visit by a delightful Croatian Sauvignon Blanc from Daruvar, but Samet went one better this time, producing a bottle which he invited us to try. One of my dining partners was a sommelier, and we were all struck by the quality of the wine, especially when Samet insisted it was Macedonian.
Scarcely believing him, I set off to investigate via my Facebook wine friends, and it was not long before I had a reply directly from Skopje, in the form of Macedonian wine guru, Ivana Simjanovska (many thanks, Ivana).
Temjanika is Muscat Blanc à Petits Grains but in Macedonia is simply know as Temjanika. Long time ago, when people tasted wine from this grape variety, the smell reminded them of Frankincense & the Macedonian word for Frankincense is “Temjan” so that’s how it got the name Temjanika. This wine is from a line of wines named Majestic from a winery called Imako Vino, one of the five biggest wine producers in the country. Temjanika is considered to be a Macedonian trademark, along with the Vranec.
Try this wine and try this restaurant. Fabulous quality and value.
