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Best Croatian style pizza
Croatia created its own way of serving pizzas. Local ingredients and favorite ones dominate that kind of pizzas. These, that we would like to describe, are these that would be hard to be found in any other country. Well, maybe in Hungary or other neighbor countries, but definitively not in a regular, chain pizzeria. Eggs, sour cream, salami, local beef meat sausage – kulen and leeks are only some of them that are worth mentioning. Mild or spicy, colorful or dimmed in colors, all depends what and where you order it. Are you curious? Read more about it below!
Let’s with some more local pizzas. By saying so, I mean pizza variation that are typical or characteristic only for Croatia or some regions or restaurants. If you want to find out more about regular Italian style pizza in Croatia, check the post: Italian top dishes for all pizza lovers in Croatia.
Local pizzas
Two of these listed below – Slavonska and Težačka are available in the whole country, however, Slavonska one is naturally more popular in the North. Težačka is not region specific and is very popular the whole Croatia long.
Pizza Težačka – Makarska
This pizza is like a work of art. A combination of a good design and several local ingredients. Here, you will find leek, bacon, cheese, onion and many more. This one we had for the first time in Makarska. A small bar offering both on site gastronomy and delivery was located close to the main promenade. The pizza was served in a paper take-away box. Was extremely hot and, comparing to other pizzas, high. The dough was thicker, well baked, however not too much. It was crunchy, with a soft inner part and fluffy. Edges were golden and crispy. The tomato sauce with shredded cheese created the bottom most layer. On it thin but long bacon slices were laid. Bacon was crispy and very well fried. Fatty parts were narrow, but the meat kept its juiciness. Between bacon slices and on it were thin leek and onion pieces. All was sprinkled with black olives’ rings and herbs. It was really good. It was a very good combination of ingredients. It created a unique flavor with dominance of bacon and cheese. More intensive leek’s aromas were a good complement to the salty bacon. During the baking process, leek’s and bacon’s aromas, soaked the dough. It was not too salty and not too spicy. Was well-balanced and interesting in the taste. Actually, I must admit, that was the first time we had a pizza with leek. Although surprised at the beginning, we were satisfied with what we got.
Pizza Slavonska - Pula
The next Croatian style pizza is pizza Slavonska. Its name originates from the Croatian region, that is located in the northern part of the country. As I said before, although that is a region-specific pizza, we saw it in menus also in other regions. Pizza Slavonska is colorful, however the red color dominates. Red pepper, local red-color sausage and intensively red tomato sauce are what you see just after your pizza comes.
We tried for the first time in Pula, not so far from the Pula Arena. The dough was thin and had a golden color. It was not so well baked, but still not raw. The shape of the pizza was not ideal circle. It was irregular and corrugated. As usually, on the tomato and cheese base were all other ingredients. There was plentiful of cheese, and it was well melted and spread all over the bottom.
Then, were meat layers. Ham and kulen (a Croatian kind of a beef sausage with red pepper and garlic) were mostly placed in the central part of the pizza. On it were thin, red onion slices and two hot green peppers. Finally, there was a lot of canned corn nicely scattered around the pizza. Although the red color was suggesting so, this pizza Slavonska was not extremely spicy. Apart from these two hot green peppers, the rest of the pizza was mild or slightly spicy. Even the kulen sausage was not too spicy.
It was a nice try. Something interesting in the form of serving and mixing ingredients.
House pizzas
Pizza Zmaj - Makarska
This house pizza from Makarska was colorful and aromatic. It had a lot of ingredients, among which, some of them are typical for countries in this region like Hungary. I mean typical to be served on a pizza. Here eggs and cream could be listed. Apart from these two ingredients, pizza Zmaj had tomatoes, cheese, ham, salami, pepper and mushrooms.
The dough was slightly hard, but still crunchy and quite good. Had a nice golden color and a regular shape. The edge without any ingredients or even without any sauce was relatively wide. The amount of the tomato sauce was also not very big. This thin tomato layer was topped with cheese shreds that fully covered the whole inner part of the pizza. On it a couple of ham slices were laid and then a raw egg was placed. On it were thin, well-fried salami slices, a couple of red pepper rings and some finely chopped mushroom slices. Pizza Zmaj was garnished with three tablespoons of the sour cream topped with green olives. These two last ingredients were, I guess added at the end of baking, as they were still very fresh.
It was very tasty. The salami and sour cream flavors composed a nice combination. Well-fried, smoky aromas were well mixed the sourness of the cream and egg’s mildness. Red pepper rings, mushroom slices and green olives were a nice, relatively fresh part of it. It was really good. Aromatic, fresh and smoky.
House Pizza Step - Korčula
A little bit similar to the Zmaj pizza was a House Pizza Step in Korčula. Although ingredients were the same, the way of serving it was different. This one was almost a masterpiece. So beautiful. So colorful. Looked so freshly and naturally.
The dough was round, maybe not ideally, but rather round than irregular. Was very well baked and extremely thin. Edges were fluffy, but empty inside, what was making it light and delicate. The color of the dough was from golden till brown, but although well baked, was ideally crunchy and not too hard to bite. Empty edges were really narrow. Almost the whole dough was evenly covered with the tomato sauce and melted cheese. The rest of the central part of the pizza had ham and thin, well-fried salami slices. Among them were very thin mushroom slices. Finely chopped, well cooked and still having natural juices. In the middle of the pizza was split a raw egg, which yolk was partially liquid. On top of the House Pizza Step were placed wide drops of sour cream and it was garnished with two or three green and black olives.
It looked wonderfully! Extremely colorful and so nicely served. Fresh, crispy and full of different aromas.
Pizza Milimetro - Umag
The last one was pizza Milimetro from Umag. This one was partially similar in ingredients to both the Zmaj pizza and to the House Pizza Step. However only ingredients were somehow similar, nothing more. The way of serving and the general flavor were completely different. Still good, however not as good as these two previous.
Pizza Milimetro was served on a nice, beautiful wooden round board, what made a very good impression.
The dough was the thicker from all we had in Croatia. It had a very regular, circle shape and evenly baked, so that each part of the dough had almost the same golden color.
Edges were not only thick but also high, what created a kind of a bucket in which all ingredients were mixed. It was not very well baked inside but was keeping its fluffiness and freshness. The base of the pizza created a regular tomato sauce and cheese. On it were scattered mushroom slices and a lot of finely cut, narrow patty-like sausages. Then, four sour cream dashes were made on the pizza. All in all, tasty, but nothing special. Worth trying as something different, but definitively the name of it – Milimetro did not correspond with the thickness of the dough and whole pizza.
Read more about local pizzas in the post: Exceptional Hungarian style pizzas.
Author: Beti – A passionate traveler and lover of Asian cuisine, especially Thai and Japanese dishes, Bernadeta brings her culinary and cultural experiences to life in her writing. Beyond her travels, she’s an avid technology enthusiast with a deep interest in data processing, merging her love for exploration with analytical insights.
Photographer: Adalbert – An aficionado of computers and photography, Adalbert captures the essence of diverse cuisines with a discerning eye. A connoisseur of rich flavors and particularly fond of meat-based dishes, he combines his technical skills with his passion for the culinary arts in every shot.
EAT IN ASIA / Food destinations / Other food destinations / Europe - european food / Croatia - croatian food
