The house’s specialty is brodetto à la Tonči, a fish stew featuring tomatoes, onions, and wine, customizable with conger eel, red scorpion fish, langouste, or lobster based on guests’ preferences. Another renowned Dalmatian dish is gregada, a fish stew with potatoes, onions, and white wine, distinct for its absence of tomato sauce. Tonči personally prepares these dishes over an open flame.
The fish is grilled over vine embers and flavored by dipping rosemary branches into homemade olive oil before sprinkling it onto the fish. Accompanying these meals are a variety of salads, embodying the taste of the sun that nurtures their growth and flavor.
As appetizers, guests enjoy salted anchovies, anchovy carpaccio with olive oil, capers, oregano, and wild arugula, all hand-picked. Additionally, there’s homemade tuna pâté on grilled bread and octopus salad with garlic, parsley, capers, and cherry tomatoes. Various vegetable dishes like roasted rosemary potatoes, fried zucchini, and eggplant cups filled with tomatoes complement the grilled fish.
The ideal accompaniment to the grilled fish is an excellent homemade wine pressed from Bogdanuša and Vugava grapes. Matijević boarding house emphasizes the use of seasonal fruits and vegetables. Spring ushers in artichokes, broad beans, and fresh young peas, combined into delightful one-pot dishes.
Young zucchini prepared in various ways and followed by young onions, radishes, and the first potatoes mark the early summer offerings. Tomatoes take center stage in summer salads, especially delightful with wild arugula.
Spring brings forth Maraska sour cherries followed by mirabelle plums, small wild plums, melons, watermelons, and figs in high summer. Autumn treats guests to sweet Regina grapes for dessert.
During winter, delightful marmalades made from bitter oranges and lemons are prepared, often used as pancake fillings in the summer months.
