History of Zadar in Unique Sweet Stories by Cake Shop “Art”

This testifies to the long presence of this sweet and juicy citrus in Zadar, which is native to Southeast Asia. On the other hand, such a thing is a bit unfair to many other fruits and ingredients from which cakes were made throughout history in the modest kitchens of Zadar housewives or old Zadar confectioneries, which almost disappeared for a while from Zadar.

Flavours of the Mediterranean in a Hundred Sweet Versions

The Zadar region is known for the cultivation of many types of fruit, the most famous of which is the Maraška sour cherry, which thrives best in the Zadar hinterland, the fertile Ravni kotari. Maraška sour cherry was made famous around the world by the old Zadar liqueur Maraschino.

However, the landscape of this part of the Mediterranean and Dalmatia entails many other fruit varieties: the delicious cherry, fig, which has a hundred faces here, peach and especially almond, which in these areas has an exceptionally hard shell, but a particularly aromatic and sweet core. One legume, which nutritionists consider to be the healthiest Mediterranean plant, carob, has also been squeezed into this abundant fruit society.

The carob bush or tree used to be an obligatory decoration of Zadar and especially island gardens, which provided a lifesaving summer shade. It is not known why this great plant disappeared from the gardens of Zadar and its surroundings. Its fruits are full of healthy fruit sugar, which is a worthy substitute for chocolate and cocoa, and the seeds were used to invent carats, unit measures for gold.

Desserts used to be kneaded, cooked and baked in Zadar out of all of these gifts of nature. It was not difficult to make an excellent cheesecake here, since the best sheep cheeses and the unique ricotta are all produced not far from Zadar, on the island of Pag. And once it was easy to find them on even closer islands to Zadar or in its hinterland.

It is not known why it was precisely orange, with the abundance of all other local fruit, that got the honour of being associated with Zadar in the cake in which it is the main ingredient. Mirjana Pilipović, a great confectioner from Zadar, uncompromisingly decided to correct this “injustice” towards other fruits and numerous other local plant and cheese ingredients.

Ms Pilipović showed her exceptional creativity and knowledge of making cakes and pies ten years ago in the Zadar “Kalelarga Art” Boutique Hotel, whose café, almost unexpectedly, became a gathering point for lovers of desserts and a place that suddenly raised the bar in Zadar's cake offer.

Therefore, Mladenka Štura, General Manager of “Kalelarga Art Hotel” and “Bastion” Hotel decided to provide her confectioner Mirjana and her team with a new confectionery workshop, a place where they will be able to express their creativity, knowledge and enthusiasm in better conditions.

So, in June of 2017 “Art Café” was opened, today a cult place for lovers of desserts, an elegantly decorated cake shop in the centre of Zadar, on the peninsula, which one enters with respect, and leaves with a blissful smile of pleasure that can only be provided by top cakes, their aromas and flavours.

Chef Mirjana bases her entire sweet opus on the best natural ingredients, primarily fruit and those made of chocolate and cheese. In doing so, she persistently avoids industrial flavours and other artificial, often unhealthy ingredients. Margarine is forbidden in her kitchen, which relies on the Zadar and Dalmatian tradition of making cakes and uses exclusively the fruits of this region, but also the scents of some types of herbs typical of the Mediterranean, such as lavender and rosemary.

Mirjana, for example, makes a phenomenal fig and lavender cake only in summer, during the lavender and fig season. How she manages to control the intense scent of lavender in this top-quality bite so that you can taste it only in sufficient and refreshing traces, remains her secret.

Cakes with the Story of Zadar

In numerous cakes and pies, the “Art Café” team follows the basic idea of making cakes the traditional way, with available seasonal fruit (and even vegetables) and cheeses in new, elegant and modern combinations. Cakes that are traditionally popular in Zadar are full of nuts such as almonds and walnuts, and it is common to bake sponge cakes from them, but Mirjana enriched these classic combinations, for example, with lavender cream and figs.

Sometimes with olive oil! And on the powerful chocolate mousse, she will place unusual Pag cheese chips…

Apart from the uniqueness of the recipes for about a hundred types of cakes that are made at the “Art Café” during the year, their uniqueness is also highlighted in the names given to them by the author Mirjana and her associates. The whole Art idea by the Manager Mladenka is based on the rich, often dramatic history of Zadar and the sights of this city and its region. Thus, the orange, almond and walnut cake was named after the Croatian queen Jelena, a Zadar native, after whom the Park in the immediate vicinity of the “Art Café” is named.

The chocolate and flower of Nin salt cake was named after the famous bishop Gregory of Nin, and the cake named Pag Rhapsody Mirjana makes out of Pag ricotta, orange and apricot.

The strong Zadar Ramparts cake is made with dark chocolate and Maraška sour cherries.

It is not only the nearby Palace, from where high-ranking officials ruled Zadar while it was part of the Venetian Republic, that was named after the Zadar Proveditor, but also a cake made of chocolate and coarsely chopped nuts at the “Art Café”. The Captain's Tower cake was named after the nearby tower, which was part of Zadar's defensive walls, and is made of apricots and fresh cow's cheese.

The Greeting to the Sun cake is made of seasonal fruit, walnuts, vanilla and chocolate. The unique Dalmatian cake contains olive oil, lemon and white chocolate, and Gibanica in the Zadar way carob, Pag ricotta and almond.

We could go on for a very long time and we still would not come to an end of the long list of sweet delicacies from Mirjana Pilipović's workshop at “Art Café” and cakes with the story of Zadar, which are “strong and enduring just like the City while at the same time exuding tenderness and beauty that enchants”, as was once brilliantly written by the journalist of the Croatian daily newspaper “Jutarnji list”, Anita Šarić.