Hiša Franko is #21 on San Pellegrino’s ‘World’s 50 Best Restaurants’ list. Hiša Franko’s chef is ranked #7 on the ‘Best Chef Awards’ list and has two coveted Michelin stars. Detect a pattern? Hiša Franko is climbing culinary ladders at breakneck speed.
Chef Roš has everything to do with it.
Hiša Franko
Perhaps you envision the world’s 21st-best restaurant in a cosmopolitan city like New York, with an inaudible hum coming from behind an unmarked door on West 9th Street. Or, in a posh Mayfair hotel, where London suit and ties gather to discuss private equity amid a buzz of banking activity. Where numbers and figures float around the room like musical notes.
Maybe you assume Chef Roš graduated with honors from the Culinary Institute of America or L’Ecole. Or, that Roš was taught to cook by a nurturing grandmother, and spent hours in the kitchen recreating family recipes, eventually trading a stained apron for crisp, chef’s whites.
You’d be wrong, on all fronts.
Hiša Franko’s Lucky #21
The 21st best restaurant in the world, Hiša Franko, is not in a sleepless city or a swanky hotel. It isn’t on a quaint American main street or hidden in a European city’s back alley. It’s not anywhere you’d ever imagine. Unless you imagine it’s on a rural, tree-lined road in Slovenia.
Then, you’d be right.
You’d also be off-base about Chef Roš, who studied international science and was destined to become a diplomat. Or, that Chef Roš played competitive sports and rarely stepped foot in a kitchen other than to eat.
Would you believe that Chef Roš entered Hiša Franko’s kitchen and had to start from scratch? Chef Roš, who is now a culinary powerhouse, has earned two Michelin stars and is a force to be reckoned with. Don’t believe me?
Just ask her husband.
Have passport, will travel
I travel for food the way others travel for a music festival, Broadway show, or museum exhibit. An extraordinary dining experience invigorates my senses in the same ways. A multi-dimensional artistic endeavor in its own right. When done well, for instance, a meal can be an Oscar-winning performance.
This summer, I drove four hours for lunch. I crossed an international border and through multiple microclimates, with my passport and rapid antigen test results in tow. Then, I drove four hours back.
Was it worth it?
Chef’s Table, Hiša Franko
It’s June 2016. My husband and I are watching one of our favorite guilty pleasures, the culinary docu-series Chef’s Table. Chef’s Table is to food what the BBC’s Planet Earth is to nature (minus David Attenborough’s mesmerizing narration).
The series documents chefs in far-flung destinations and overlays interviews with dramatic music to reel the viewer in. I’m that fish who gets hooked every time.
Who’s the Chef?
Tonight’s episode features Chef Ana Roš, a chef I’d never heard of. This is exactly the point of the show—to introduce cutting-edge culinary talent to food-obsessed people like me.
Chef’s Table serves up unusual food adventures in destinations around the world. It delivers them to our living rooms to be enjoyed alongside our UberEats and DoorDash orders.
Food is presented in much the same way a docent introduces a Manet at the Met. A well-thought-out, but the concise narration of the artist and painting. Using all the right descriptors to whet the appetite, create intrigue, and allow for personal interpretation.
My husband lights a fire and we settle in. Ready to travel to Hiša Franko from the comfort of our well-worn leather couch? Beside us, the dogs are snoring. ‘Where are we going tonight?’, I wonder, as I pull a cozy Sferra blanket over my legs.
Slovenia.
Slovenia?
Do they mean Slovakia? Sardinia? Or, Armenia? Where is Slovenia? We are less than two minutes into the show. I press pause to find an Atlas. My husband sighs.
‘Slovenia is in Eastern Europe, above Croatia, below Austria. Next to Italy and Hungary’, I proudly relay to Daniel. ‘Some might say north, south, east, and west,’ he replies with undiluted sarcasm. I ignore him. Geography lesson complete. I press play.
The episode chronicles Ana’s unlikely journey from a woman destined to become a diplomat in Brussels, who instead inherits a local inn and restaurant. With no culinary training, she turns it into one of the best restaurants in the world and inadvertently puts Slovenia on the culinary map.
Franko’s house
Ana Roš and Valter Kramar took over his family’s inn and restaurant, located deep in Slovenia’s Soča Valley, in 2000. It had been owned by the Kramars since 1970. Franko is Valter’s father. Hiša means house. Franko’s House.
The inn and restaurant are not only Ana and Valter’s business, it’s their family home. With Ana in the kitchen as the chef, Valter was able to realize his lifelong dream of creating a cheese and wine cellar.
Valter ages his ‘Tolminic’ cheese for years and stocks his cellar with natural Slovenian vintages. His appreciation for crazy and unusual wines adds yet another dimension to the dining experience at Hiša Franko. Ana and Valter are as naturally paired as their food and wine.
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Serendipity
Years after watching Hiša Franko’s episode of Chef’s Table, we plan a family trip to Istria, Croatia. My trusted atlas is again put to good use. I quiz Daniel, ‘Did you know that the Istrian peninsula borders Slovenia?’ A slightly raised eyebrow leads me to believe I just may have sparked an idea.
Serendipitously, we discover our Istrian villa is within driving distance of Hiša Franko. That is if you consider 4 hours driving distance. I hop on the computer and make a reservation.
With far fewer destination diners to compete with, I secured a reservation for our date. But truth be told, Slovenia isn’t simple to get to even when there isn’t a worldwide pandemic. And, even if you are already in the country below it. Correction, south of it.
I didn’t factor in the border crossing. Or, the need for a 48-hour advance negative COVID test to cross it. More importantly, there is the minor issue of transportation. Details to be figured out at later date (aka procrastination).
What kind of foodie are you?
There are two kinds of foodies. Those who would drive 4 hours for lunch, and everyone else. If the thought of driving 300 miles round-trip for a meal seems reasonable to you, then you are my people.
At 8am, we leave our villa. Our minivan driver is a Croatian woman named Marta. She tells us about a lesser-known border crossing into Slovakia, I mean, Slovenia. This is August in Europe, and border traffic is a killer. Passport in hand, the excursion feels like a covert mission.
En route to Hiša Franko, we pass hamlets puddled at the base of towering mountains. It’s a dreary morning, and fog hangs low in the air, cutting the mountains in half. This only adds to the mystique of the journey. However, it creates drama, especially as we drive through dense forests filled with Croatia’s famous truffles. My excitement is as palpable as the earthy, musky scent in the air.
Border patrol
At 915am, we pull up to a sleepy border patrol crossing cut into the hills. Why do I feel like I’m doing something illegal? This is just lunch, after all, not the finalé of The Sound of Music.
Menacing clouds press up against the Slovenia landscape in the distance. My hand shaking slightly, I hold up my phone to show the border police photographic evidence of our negative test results. I accidentally swipe left and the faces of my nieces fill the screen. Whoops.
The policeman grunts a guttural, ‘cute’ at their insta-worthy faces before I quickly swipe back to the results. The rain starts to gain momentum. He waves us through. We are in Slovenia. 3 hours to go.
Colors of Slovenia
The sun cuts in and out, revealing towering mountains with sheer rock face walls. Thick clouds that pool heavily in the valleys are just beginning to lift. The scene auto-fills with gem-like tones. Lapis lazuli, malachite, and topaz eke through.
In the final stretch to Hiša Franko, we notice golden flax-rolled bales of hay, an emerald green river (no doubt filled with trout), and lush trees. The colors, after hours of heavy rain, are unreal.
At Hiša Franko, It’s all in the details
It’s 1145am. By the time we arrive at Hiša Franko, the sky is fully transformed. The ominous weather has moved on. Or, maybe it never reached this magical enclave in the Soča Valley. It hardly matters now. The blue sky is a gift after hours of murky fog and narrow, winding roads.
The Hiša Franko farmhouse is located just beyond the small settlement of Kobarid, (est. population: 1060, as of 2016). Its exterior echoes Benjamin Moore’s ‘Dark Salmon’ paint chip.
Flowers the colors of ripe red fruits spill out from tall shuttered windows. Originally built in the 1860s, it’s a small peach of a building set in front of a big apple-green mountain.
The common spaces at the inn are designed by someone with a true eye for art and photography. I intend to seek that person out, but can’t help thinking it’s none other than Ana and Valter. That their eye for food and wine naturally extends to every other type of design comes as no surprise.
Inside Hiša Franko’s dining room, the warm hues continue. Tomato red walls act as a rich contrast to white linen. A long, central, wooden table is the hub for wine bottles, glasses, and barware. Valter’s domain.
Abstract art is framed along the main wall of the intimate space. It’s aligned at the baseline, which is atypical. As is the decanter, which spirals upwards like a snake being charmed. I am in love with the decanter. I hope my husband reads this before Christmas.
Hovering disk-shaped light fixtures lower the ceiling and add even more intimacy. It’s subtle details like these that make me appreciate all that has gone into making Ana’s restaurant such a treasured place.
23 and me
How does one prepare for a 23-course lunch? With healthy trepidation and an empty stomach. We are no strangers to chef-led dining experiences, as it’s the surprises that make them all the more worthwhile.
We are a group of six, including my 17-year-old daughter. Hiša Franko is one of her first true multi-course, experimental, culinary adventures. I am silently proud when she opts to try everything, despite any preconceived notions of what is being served.
This is no simple undertaking, as many ingredients are unlike anything we have seen, eaten, or even heard of, before.
I’m prepared for the variety of locally inspired ingredients. The hearty foods that have kept Slovenians fed for generations: notably, lamb, pork, and trout. I’m less prepared to see bear paw on the menu. Immediately I assume that bear paw is the name of a wild mushroom, like Lion’s Mane or Hen of the Woods.
Leave it to my curious daughter to point to the menu and ask, “Is this really bear paw?’. ‘Indeed it is!’, comes the unexpected reply.
Our server goes on to explain that a certain number of brown bears are culled each year due to the increase in population and the risks they pose to local villagers.
Was I ready to try it? Ummmm, sort of?
The meat of the bear paw is supposedly very tender, on par with slow-cooked beef. Our bear paw is minced and nestled into a beautiful dumpling. The dumpling is surrounded by a forest consommé and topped with green leaves.
I savor each bite, letting the earthy broth linger on my tastebuds. It’s worth the trip for this course alone.
Yet, there are 22 more to go.
Hiša Franko: A story of reincarnation
Our menu is titled, ‘Reincarnation’. It’s particularly fitting, as Ana effortlessly brings new life to humble ingredients. Cauliflower is accompanied by black truffle, egg, milk skin, and buttermilk powder. Trout is cured with fig leaves, barley water, cucumber, and elderflower.
Valter’s cheeses are served with local beeswax and nettle gnocchi. Unique combinations of well-known ingredients create layers of new tastes and textures. A culinary story of rebirth.
My favorite course at Hiša Franko is one that I had prematurely decided would be my least. Two warm corn beignets are plated on a thick slab of a tree trunk. Inside is a mixture of fermented cottage cheese, smoked trout roe, and wild chives. Heaven in a bite. Always trust the chef.
Each course is one artistic expression of Ana’s homeland after another. I photograph discreetly, to have visual proof of a meal that is almost too hard to describe.
Valter’s Cellar
Hiša Franko’s menu has three ways to pair wine: ’Funky’, ‘Local’, and ‘Juicy’. We choose ‘Local’ as I can’t imagine having the opportunity to try eight different types of Slovenian wine again in the foreseeable future.
While I’ve never heard of any of the wines being served, each is a natural fit for its course. A 2013 Royal PetNat, a 2005 Stemberger Cherry Oxy, and an intriguing wine called Aci Urbajs Organic Anarchy, are examples. If I didn’t say it then, Valter, thank you! Next time, I’m coming back for ‘Funky’.
Choreographing a meal at Hiša Franko
Hiša Franko’s dining room is slightly more formal than its farmhouse exterior belies. The servers are dressed in what can best be described as costumes, rather than uniforms. Their jackets are adorned with bold patterns of vines and clusters of grapes. The experience is an organic, whimsical, and well-orchestrated performance.
It’s a ballet of sorts. Touches of theater are dotted throughout the meal. The way our table had three servers present each course in unison, making sure to use eye contact to stay in sync.
World’s Best
Ana and Valter’s is just the kind of unlikely, unconventional, and unexpected culinary story that the world needs. A world where a small restaurant, deep in the virtually unknown Julian Alps, is discovered and acknowledged for extraordinary food. Where a chef with no formal training can not only thrive, but reinvent.
Ana Roš’s star is still rising, and we are all the lucky beneficiaries of her journey. If we choose to follow.
Her story is just one reason of many to visit Armenia, I mean Slovenia.
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Wow, nicely written. I had the pleasure of experiencing Ana’s menu a week ago.
I enjoyed reading your post and reliving the experince ?
P.s. Yeah, the bear paw was a surprise, but the photo shows a different course, not the bear paw dumpling… ? (it’s the pasta with apricot filling).
Thank you for the correction, Sara. I just fixed it. Any other food adventures to share? I’m all ears! -Jamie