Did you know that Pope Gelasius 1 was the person who officially declared 14 February  as St. Valentine’s Day back in the year 496? Yes, Valentine’s Day has been celebrated for centuries and we are going to continue the celebration this year at the restaurant.

To accommodate the Chinese New Year, we are commemorating Valentine’s Day for a whole week from 9-14 February. We are arranging an extra special dining experience for you and your loved one to make it a night to remember. Here’s a preview of what to expect with our Valentine’s Dinner Set.

(View the video on Facebook)

Menu

Chef Zoran has prepared a special menu for the occasion:

Appetiser

Prawns with basil tomato sauce
OR
Quail paté
OR
Leek & Pumpkin soup

Main Course

Chicken Stroganoff
OR
Cod Romesco
OR
Lamb chop with wild mushroom & spinach

Dessert

Strawberry Pavlova

RM89++ per person. Available from 9-14 February 2010 only.

Download Valentine’s Menu

Early Bird Special

If you make a booking for the Valentine’s Dinner before Friday, 4 February, you will be eligible for a 10% discount on all items in our Wine Menu. Please call to make your reservations now.

P.S. If you want to know more about the history of Valentine’s Day, see this History Channel video

Christmas is coming! And the new year is right on its heels.

At Dubrovnik Restaurant we’ve put together Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve menus to celebrate the occasion.

Christmas Eve Menu

Appetizer

Salad with Prawns sautéed in white wine sauce
and
Soup with ricotta and parmesan cheese ravioli

Main Course

Croatian traditionally baked Lamb Peka with Croatian traditional
pasta and mixed salad
or
Roasted Turkey roll filled with spinach and smoked turkey ham,
served with Croatian traditional pasta and mixed salad

Dessert

Apple Strudel with Vanilla Sauce and Rum & Raisin Ice Cream
Special Christmas Champagne Punch

Download Christmas Menu

Finally here are some pictures of the dishes featured above:

RM150++ per person. Available only on 24th December. Please call to make reservations.

What about the New Year’s Eve menu? Please stay tuned or you can call us to enquire. Thanks!

Picture credit: CHRISTMAS TIME!!! on Flickr

Beginning today and all through November, we are running a contest specially for our Facebook Fans. The prize: a dinner for 2 at Dubrovnik Restaurant!

Here’s how to take part in the contest:

1. Browse through our menu in the Dubrovnik Menu photo album.
2. Choose the dish you want to try the most.
3. Comment on the photo of that dish in the album. Tell us in your most creative way why you want to taste this dish at Dubrovnik Restaurant.

Example:

I don’t care about the number of calories in the Tre Formaggi pizza, the only number I care about is THREE – mozzarella, chévre and gorgonzola!

Here’s the contest page on Facebook. Make sure you are a Dubrovnik Restaurant Facebook Fan! We will contact the winner through Facebook.

We will be choosing 2 lucky winners in November. You and a friend will enjoy a special dinner specially prepared by our chef! Winners will be contacted through Facebook so be sure to check your Facebook Inbox regularly. All the best!

We would also love it if you tell your friends! You can use the Suggest to Friends link on our Facebook Page. Thanks for your support!

Some terms and conditions:

• This contest is open to individuals living Malaysia who are Facebook Fans of Dubrovnik Restaurant.
• Dubrovnik Restaurant reserve the right to moderate, modify or delete your comment if it is off topic, offensive or spam.
• The judge’s decision is final.
• The closing date, prize and contest mechanics is subject to change with out any notice.
• By participating in this contest you agree to allow Dubrovnik Restaurant to use your comment for promotional purposes.
• By participating in this contest you implicitly agree to these terms and conditions.

Dina made a video to tell you about our wood fire oven. Click the button above to view the video on Facebook.

One of the unique features of Dubrovnik Restaurant is our wood fire oven. It’s a big and bulky item in the kitchen and quite expensive to maintain, but we wanted to create the most authentic flavours we could. We use the oven to cook many of our popular dishes including Peka, pizzas, palacinke, and Lamb Samobor.

In the video, Dina describes one of our most popular dishes–the Chicken Peka. Please watch the video and leave a comment or ‘Like’ it on Facebook. Also, make sure you come and taste one of our dishes cooked in the oven. See you soon!

Last month, I was kindly invited by the Croatian Professor, Dr. Andjelko Simic, to give a guest lecture to his students at HELP University on running a restaurant in Malaysia.

The lecture was organised by the School of Hospitality and Tourism and the theme was Introducing Tourism and Hospitality Business in Malaysia. I was very honored to present in front of 70 students and a couple of professors. At first I was a bit worried at how all this is going to look like as it was my first time lecturing, but I was impressed by how quietly everyone was sitting and paying very much attention to my lecture.

As this topic is very close to my heart the information was spilling out without a problem. The students had some very interesting questions which I was very happy to answer and share some of my experience with them. Dr. Simic was also very kind and gave me a present which really made me nostalgic. It was one of his sons paintings of the city which I’m from called Samobor. Overall it was a great experience and it really made me reflect back on what I have done and achieved in the last two years.

Last week, Dubrovnik Restaurant hosted a group of local bloggers to a special evening of traditional Croatian cuisine. Many of them had not even heard of Dubrovnik City let alone taste our cuisine, so it was exciting to introduce them to our dishes and see their reactions.

Here are some photos from the night:

The bloggers have published their reviews along with their photographs. Here’s what some of them said.

Lovely ambiance, interesting & delicious food, & friendly service. The price may be slightly high, but for the quality that you get, it’s worth paying the price to try out something different.
– Ruth from The Ruthless Eaters

The lamb was tender and moist, falling off the bone, and the spices had worked in erasing the lamby smell. Highly recommended
- Cheng Yi from Have Your Cake and Eat It Too

Thanks to Ruth from Ruthless Eaters, Cheng Yi from Have Your Cake and Eat it Too, Jo & May from Cumi and Ciki, Bok from Taufulou, Becky from The Nomad Gourmand, Bangsar Babe, Yat, Wilson from Places and Food, FOODnTRAVELla for experiencing Croatian cuisine and culture with us. Be sure to visit their blogs and read their reviews!

As Asia’s first Croatian restaurant, we are ambassadors to the region. We realise that many people don’t know Croatia very well, so we present to you these 10 interesting facts.

Hrvatska is the native name for Croatia. This is why Croatian websites end with ‘.hr’. Kvarner, Istria and Dalmatia are names of popular regions in Croatia.

Croatia has a very rich history, stretching back to as early as the 7th century. Over the ages, Croatia culture has been influenced by Romans, the Slavs and Hungarians. The Republic of Croatia today was founded on 25 June 1991.

Dubrovnik Old City

Croatia is home to 7 UNESCO World Heritage sites, including the Old City of Dubrovnik (which the restaurant is named after), the Diocletian Palace in Split and the Plitvice Lakes National Park

Croatian cuisine is a cuisine of regions, reflecting Croatian geography, history and culture. Hungarians brought goulash and paprikash (meat stew), the Turks left sarma (stuffed sauerkraut rolls), stuffed green peppers and rolled dough, while the Italians left their trace in various kinds of pasta.

Marco Polo (1254-1324), an adventurer, merchant and one of the best known world travelers, whose book “The Travels of Marco Polo” is the first tourist book in the world, comes from Korcula on Korcula island in Croatia.

The necktie, worn by businessmen around the world, is a product of Croatia. To celebrate World Tie Day, an enormous necktie was worn around the Arena in Pula, one of the cities in Istria.

Necktie around Pula Arena

The fountain pen and the technical pencil—the predecessor of the modern mechanical pencil—was invented by a Croat, Eduard Penkala, in 1906. The word ‘pen’ was derived from his family name.

Dalmatians, the breed of dog featured in the movie 101 Dalmatians, are named after Dalmatia, in which most of the Croatian Adriatic is located.

Dalmatian Dog

Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), the father of alternative current electricity and technology of wireless communications, after which the unit for magnetic induction is named, was born in Croatia, and that he refused to receive the Nobel prize he had to share with T. A. Edison.

Croatians are accomplished sportsmen, excelling in soccer, tennis, skiing and basketball among many. Some popular athletes include Davor Suker, Niko Kovac, Goran Ivanisevic, and Toni Kukoc.

Croatia football team

If you would like to experience Croatian culture further, you’re in luck! The Contemporary Croatian Drawing exhibition is being staged at the National Art Gallery of Malaysia. This exhibition is supported by the Croatian Ministry of Culture and will be open from 9-31 October 2009. For more information, please call 03-4253 5340 or download the info kit.

Of course, you can also visit Dubrovnik Restaurant to experience Croatian culture through its cuisine. Make a reservation.

The Embassy of the Republic of Croatia in Malaysia will be organising a Contemporary Croatian Drawing exhibition at the National Art Gallery, off Jalan Tun Razak, from Oct 9 to Oct 31.

The exhibition comprises 140 drawings and is part of a 4-year long tour beginning in 2005 in Amman, Jordan. The exhibition is a selection of works of artists belonging to various generations and presents a cross-section of the creative achievements in this medium. The exhibition shows on a broader scale the dynamics of the Croatian contemporary art scene, the complexity and diversity of approach and technique, as well as the richness of artistic expression in Croatia.

For more information, please call 03-4253 5340 or download the info kit.

Download Info Kit

We would like to invite you to the latest hip and trendy alfresco dining spot in Kuala Lumpur… Dubrovnik Restaurant’s terrace!

We have renovated the exterior of our restaurant and turned it into a terrace. The last few weeks have been busy with adding a new wooden deck, selecting furniture for the terrace and adding fans to make sure the terrace was comfortable for our guests.

The terrace is perfect for a lazy afternoon lunch, happy hour with friends or a cool dinner out in trendy Solaris, Mont Kiara. See the pictures and tell us what you think.

We had the honor to host Stephane Barlerin, a wine connoisseur from M. Chapoutier vinery, in South of France. This happens to be our Head Chef Zoran’s favorite region for wines, Rhone Valley. Stephane presented 5 different types of Rhone Valley wines finishing off with a sweet Muscat. The wines of course were accompanied by our Head Chef’s special creations of cocktail style finger food, such as Mini lamb burgers, Duck comfit, Mojito Sorbet.

We have now added these wines to our Drinks menu. Please come savor these fine wines if you are a wine connoisseur yourself.

Download Wine List

Download Drinks Menu

If you’d like to be notified of future wine events be sure to sign up for our mailing list.