Our first week in BIG BERRY resort
It has been exactly two weeks since we all gathered in our new working place. We were all very excited to finally come and see this place we were ˝promoting˝ for the past few weeks. The BIG BERRY dream team is very colorful and international — made out of Croats, Spanish, German and Vietnamese, and we expect few more nationalities to join us very soon. The working atmosphere is casual, with a lots of interactions and humor.
Our first guests were bloggers — Andreja from Slovenia, Veronika from Czech Republic, Cristina from the U.S. and Maria from Bulgaria, who is collaborating with us from before.
From the first day on, the pace has been pretty intense, our schedule is full of workshops, wine & beer tastings, visits to the restaurants, etc. Each day we visit one of the three partner restaurants — ˝Pri starem Pildu˝ in Metlika, ˝Gostilna Müller˝ in Črnomelj and ˝Restaurant Veselič˝ in Podzemelj. “Pri Pildu” offers to us a free choice of food, while the other two create a special daily Big Berry menu containing three different meals, of which one is always vegetarian.
At first, we visited Bernarda Kump from “BIBI turizem” in Črnomelj who taught us how to prepare Bela Krajina’s traditional bread (pogača). Hang from Vietnam digged into the dough, although it was her first time. Thanks to Bernarda’s guidance, the pogača turned out to be amazing! This pogača is Bernarda’s version of Belokranjska pogača, which is so delicious that we have to share the recipe with you:
BIBI POGAČA
½ kg flour
20 gr fresh yeast
2 teaspoons sugar
3 dcl warm water
Salt
Egg
Cumin seeds
Mix yeast with water and sugar and leave it to rise next to a warm source for about 15 minutes. Mix all the other ingredients with it and form a dough. Leave to rise for 20 minutes. Spread the dough evenly onto a baking tray, slice it into squares and glaze it with the beaten egg and sprinkle with cumin and salt. Bake in a preheated oven for approximately 15 minutes at 225°C.
Later that day we had an unofficial opening at our reception house. It was the perfect opportunity to get to know each other. The partner’s promo gifts were opened and among them there was champagne with gold leaves. How fancy are we?!
The next day we continued with our schedule and on the top of it was wine degustation. We went to the winery Malnarič-Nampel in Semič where we were hosted by one of the winemakers — Marko. He showed us the most well-known sorts of the region of Bela krajina, among which were Metliška črnina and Belokranjec, the most beloved wines of the area. We were delighted to have opportunity to taste several sorts, and it was really hard to decide which one we liked the most.
Next thing on our list was the trip to the residence of another partner — Čebelarstvo Veselič in Metlika. They hosted us a warm welcome offering us their homemade honey liquor, and took us on a tour around their bee farm. We learned a lot about process of producing honey and products from it, about good impact of those products to our health and you know what?! We realized that we’re really lucky to have the bees around us!
On Wednesday we got the invitation to visit Katja Jakljevič, the Queen of Metliška črnina for 2015 so we went to film a short video about her experience as a Queen.
As the week was coming to an end, our group was enlarged by the bloggers Cameron Seagle and Natasha Alden, from the States. They joined us for the traditional bonfire on the river, the day before the Labour day. When we arrived to the “crime scene”, we found out that Peter, our campsite manager, is the falafel master! There, we gathered with our friends — volunteers from Phillipines, Indonesia and Poland. The next day was time for our own party — the celebration of 1st of May and a barbeque made by our local masterchef Jan. With lot of good energy and friendly atmosphere, we have closed another week. Great job Big Berries!
written by Vita Polančec & Kristina Birovljević
