Truffles, a Riva and a Michelin Star: Rovinj in Gourmet Season
Maistra's Autumn Gourmet Week packed four October days in Rovinj with vegetable-led fine dining, a truffle hunt and a swim in the Adriatic. Here is the itinerary.
The best dish of a four-day Rovinj food trip turned out to be an omelette. It was made by a truffle hunter’s mother, and the truffles in it had been dug up that same morning. That is the sort of plot twist Maistra Hospitality Group built into its Autumn Gourmet Week, which ran from October 16 to 19 and was written up as a diary by Katarina Doric of DSCENE.
The pitch is simple. Come to Istria once the summer crowds have gone. The Adriatic still holds some sun, the olives are being picked and the truffle dogs are working. Doric found a region where food stays tied to land, season and the people who produce it. Here is how the week played out.
Friday night: a Michelin star with a vegetable habit
Base camp was Hotel Monte Mulini, a five-star, adults-only hotel above Lone Bay just outside Rovinj’s old centre. It has welcomed guests since 2009 and has recently been renovated, with new interiors and new dining concepts. All 112 rooms and suites have a balcony facing the Adriatic.
Dinner on night one was across town at the Grand Park Hotel Rovinj, on the fifth floor, at Cap Aureo. The Michelin-starred restaurant looks over the marina and the old town. Chef Jeffrey Vella puts vegetables and seasonal Istrian ingredients at the centre of his tasting menu. Cap Aureo calls itself a vegetable-loving space, and Doric was struck by how much invention Vella brings to ingredients that usually play supporting roles.
There are three menus. My Istria sticks to ingredients sourced within 50 kilometres. A Journey Since 2019 revisits dishes from the restaurant’s history. Towards a Greener Thought is fully vegetarian. Croatian wines feature heavily on the list. The chef also sat down with the group to talk seasonality, local producers and the Mediterranean pace of life. Doric picked the evening as her favourite meal of the trip.
Saturday: dogs, drizzle and a very good breakfast
The next morning went inland to Prodan Tartufi, where Mirko and his trained dog led the group into the forest. Doric had never hunted truffles before and found it more thrilling than expected. The dog sniffs, everyone waits for a signal, and something may or may not be under the soil. They found two black truffles. Back at the tasting area, Mirko’s mother shaved fresh truffle over an omelette. After Cap Aureo’s elaborate menu the night before, Doric found the simplicity just as satisfying.
Next came Ipša, a family-owned olive oil and wine estate with stone buildings, terraces and hills of groves and vines. The visit fell during the harvest, so the group watched some of the picking. They learned how olive variety, timing and processing shape the flavour of an extra virgin oil. There were four oils to taste side by side, plus the estate’s wines.
Lunch was at Kantinon, a waterfront restaurant inspired by Istria’s fishermen’s cooking, with local seafood and regional recipes and a view of the old town. Dinner was back at the hotel, at Riva Lounge, one of its newest additions. It was created with Riva Destinations and borrows from the Italian yacht builder: mahogany finishes, nautical details, a Mediterranean menu.
Sunday: the sea, from both sides
Doric began the day with a swim in Lone Bay before breakfast, a pleasure she rates highly in October. A slow morning followed in the Art Wellness & Spa at Monte Mulini, which is linked to the wellness facilities at Hotel Lone.
Then the group boarded a Riva Aquariva Special for a cruise around Rovinj. From the water the old town’s colourful buildings rise straight from the shoreline, with the bell tower of St Euphemia above them. Doric said it looked almost like a painting. The polished wood and classic Italian lines of the boat made it one of her highlights.
The boat dropped everyone at the old town, and lunch was at Brasserie Adriatic in Hotel Adriatic on the main square. It borrows the mood of a French brasserie and pairs Mediterranean flavours with local produce. Afterwards came a wander through narrow streets, past stone houses, small galleries and glimpses of the sea. October, Doric notes, strikes the balance: lively enough for open cafés and restaurants, quiet enough to walk with no destination.
The last dinner broke from the Istrian script. Tekka by Lone, the Japanese restaurant at Hotel Lone, combines Japanese technique with Adriatic ingredients, with sushi, sashimi and contemporary seafood dishes. It also showed off Hotel Lone’s contemporary architecture, a long way in feel from the intimacy of Monte Mulini.
Monday: the drive out
After breakfast at Monte Mulini, the group checked out and drove to Zagreb Airport. In four days they had gone through forests for truffles, tasted olive oil where it is made, eaten at a Michelin-starred table and seen Rovinj from the sea.
The takeaway for shoulder-season travellers is that the program works because it mixes registers. A tasting menu sits beside an omelette, a yacht-inspired lounge beside a fishermen’s tavern, and a Japanese dinner closes a week of Istrian food. Doric arrived expecting great food and a few days by the sea. She left, in her words, already thinking about when she might return.
Via DSCENE