What to eat in Novi Sad
Fish soup from the kettle, perkelt and poppy-seed strudel — and the salaš, where lunch is the whole programme.
- Fish soup
- From Danube fish, red and hot
- Home cooking
- Sarma, stuffed peppers, perkelt
- Sweet
- Poppy-seed strudel, doughnuts, cakes
Vojvodina cooking is closer to Hungarian and Austrian than to anything south of the Sava: paprika in everything, pastries and cakes as a course of their own, and a lunch that is not a break in the day but its main event.
The salaš, and why it takes three hours
A salaš was a self-contained farmstead out on the plain — house, stable, well and fields around it. Several have been turned into restaurants with rooms, and you go not for a sight but for a lunch that begins with soup and ends with strudel three hours later. In between come sarma or perkelt, home-baked bread and wine from Karlovci. This is not a quick meal and should not be planned as one; nothing is toured after a salaš.
Fish soup on the Danube
Danube fish soup is red with paprika and made from several kinds of fish at once, cooked outdoors in a kettle when there are guests. It is hot, and that is normal rather than a mistake; home-baked bread goes with it and nothing else.
What to order
- Sarma — cabbage leaves stuffed with minced meat and rice, cooked long. A winter dish made all year, and best on the second day.
- Perkelt — a heavily paprika'd stew with pasta or dumplings. Hungarian inheritance that is not hidden here but boasted about.
- Poppy-seed strudel — stretched pastry with poppy seed or sour cherries. In Vojvodina a cake is a course, not something to go with coffee.
- Bermet — an aromatised dessert wine with herbs and spices, from Sremski Karlovci and Fruška Gora; a cellar tasting is arranged before you arrive.
What to book
- A salaš at the weekend. Salaš 137 in Čenej, for one, requires a booking ahead for Saturday and Sunday; turn up unannounced and you risk going without a table.
Before you go
Short answers to what people ask most before setting out.
What is a salaš?
A Vojvodina farmstead on the plain, today a restaurant, often with rooms too. You go for the lunch rather than for sightseeing.
How hot is the fish soup?
It is hot, and deliberately so. Red with paprika, made from several kinds of Danube fish, and served with home-baked bread and nothing else.
How much is a meal in Novi Sad?
A dish in a simple restaurant in town costs €7–12.
Ready for Novi Sad?
Where to next
The best time to visit Novi Sad
→Novi Sad has no sea and no mountain to soften summer — May, June and September strike the best balance of…
Sremski Karlovci · 9 km
→The peace of 1699, a school from 1791, and bermet from the cellars
How well does Novi Sad suit you?
→Six questions: a score for this place and others like it.
Front row for the next trip
Leave your email and we'll let you know when a new destination or story goes up.