A Taste of Croatia...savoring the food, people and traditions of Croatia's Adriatic coast...is both a user-friendly cookbook and an intriguing travel memoir dedicated to the land that the New York Times recently dubbed the "New Riviera." Packed with straight-forward recipes, photos, food facts and anecdotes, the author has created a publication that goes beyond the bounds of what makes a great cookbook...she delivers the spirit of the culture, the country and the cuisine and then ties it all together with a collection of recipes that will make you want to run to your kitchen and start cooking. Today, throughout America, we are hearing more and more about the benefits of eating fresh, seasonal, local foods that are grown and produced using sustainable methods. However, for today's cooks, it can be difficult to know exactly how to incorporate these concepts into our busy lives without it being too complicated, time consuming or expensive. Toss in a dash of ethnicity and even the most competent home cook can become discouraged. Fear not: A Taste of Croatia provides a straightforward and easy way to celebrate a culture whose dishes can be created anywhere fresh ingredients can be found...all the while capturing you with an inspiring story that will allow you to set out on your own adventure...without leaving your favorite chair. A Taste of Croatia is based on the author and her husband's three-year odyssey sailing the Adriatic coast and living aboard their 50-foot sailboat. It is the story of the lands they explored, the people they met, the markets they visited and the foods they enjoyed. Presented as a well organized, easy-to-use cookbook, most of the recipes have been savored by generations of Croatians and all of the recipes have been adapted for use in American kitchens. It is the author's hope to provide each reader with his or her own enriching, delicious, inspiring and thought-provoking "taste of Croatia."
Never in my wildest dreams, would I have ever predicted that I would spend more than 6 years sailing the coastlines of France, Italy, Greece, Turkey and Croatia - absorbing the history and culture of these countries while sharing in the lives and the lifestyle of the warm and welcoming people. But life is full of surprises and what began as a short-term holiday evolved into an incredible (and sometimes) challenging lifestyle.
Nor could I have predicted an everlasting love affair with Croatia. There is not a trace of Croatian ancestry in our family and quite honestly my knowledge of this country (once a part of the former Yugoslavia) was embarrassingly bleak when my husband Bill and I arrived in Dubrovnik in the summer of 2000. At that time, we thought we might stay a week or a month. But Croatia quickly seduced us. The Croatian cruising lifestyle was magic ... a seemingly endless choice of protected coves, charming medieval villages, and a generous and welcoming people whose food was simple, delicious and rich with tradition. We stayed three years.
However good things do come to an end. As the years passed, my yearning for a land-based community drove us to search for a new home in a sunny clime. Now we're in sun-drenched southern California where we farm walnuts, Ojai Pixie tangerines, lavender and olives - all Mediterranean-inspired crops. I love the rural, food-and-land focused lifestyle; helping to grow the crops, refining the products, developing recipes, teaching cooking classes and writing about food.
