 Look at that eel and frog's leg bro day. Oh, I'm Matthew Horkey. And I'm Sherin Tan. Together we are Exotic Wine Travel. We've spent the last three years traveling around the world writing and speaking about unique and exciting wines. Our journey has taken us to both lesser known and established wine regions. In 2016, we came to Croatia for the first time. We fell in love with the country and the wines, prompting us to write the book Cracking Croatian Wine, A Visitor Friendly Guide. Now we're at it again. We're going to retour the country and bring our book to life. We aim to take you deep into the Croatian food and wine scene. So sit back, relax, and join us as we go Cracking Croatian Wine. Many visitors to Croatia flock to the Dalmatian Islands and for good reason. However, on mainland Dalmatia, there is a lot to be discovered in terms of food and wine. Pretty steep, man. The steep vineyards of Kamarna are just north of Dubrovnik. This is a relatively new region where Plovac's Malian Poeship are grown organically. Producers like Rizman, Terre Magi, and Volarevic are making some exciting wines here. We don't have time to stop on this trip. We're heading to the Noretva Delta. It's a unique green landscape that stands out like a sore thumb in bone-dry Dalmatia. It's here that the Noretva River comes down from the mountains in Bosnia and finally meets the Adriatic Sea. We're heading to the Prović winery located in the Hotel Marló. Here Viecoslav Prović makes wine with his father Bronco and his sister Monika. We're one of the few producers to work with the rare white grape Slatarica. As I said, it's just the third year we're making it and we're still learning. It's a variety that was almost forgotten in the area because wine growers had a difficult time selling the grapes. Slatarica means gold in Croatian and it gets small ground spots on it and when wine growers would sell it on the market, people used to think that it was beginning to overripen and that it wasn't good. Wine growers started to see the potential as well so I think it's now on the rebound and it makes for a very light fruity floral wine. We taste the latest vintage of the excellent fresh Chardonnay. Prović also makes a food-friendly rosé from Sera in Marló and a juicy red blend of Cabernet and Marló. It's been a long day so we make our way to our wine-themed room for the night. The next day the sun is shining and we are excited. The Prović family has cooked us up a tradition Nuretvian meal. Because of the wetlands, the food from Nuretva is markedly different from the rest of Croatia. The first dish is a spicy blue crab over pasta. There's something really fragrant about it. This is spicy and fantastic, this is outstanding blue crab. Next is the local specialty, grilled eel with polenta. This species of eel is particular to the Nuretva Delta and shireen is thrilled. It's prepared on fire on the grill with simply the salt but it tastes really sweet. Just the right amount of fat that gives it this smooth arugula on the mouth, it's really good. The second main is an eel and frog brode or loco stew. The frogs are caught by hand. You put a strong light on the top of your boat, a small boat that was showing you in the summer and you can catch the frog because it's blinded by light, you can catch it by your hand. This isn't a dish for everyone but it's spicy, earthy and delicious. You taste this, you notice it's not from the sea, this is from the river. We're stuffed but it's time to move on. We're heading up the coast to the city of Primoštiv. The surrounding areas of the city are known as a prime spot for the great Babic. We first went to the locally famous Babic vinyar known as Bucovits in 2016. It's a UNESCO listed site and something to behold. There are several excellent producers of Babic in the area like Grasin, Zlatanotok, Birin and Rock. To the north of Primoštiv is the town of Skradin. Most visitors come here and take the boat upriver to the nearby Kurka National Park, which is known for its crystal clear waters and numerous waterfalls. Above the National Park is the tiny village of Plastivol, which is home to several unique wine grapes. Ante Sladic winery is a small producer who focuses on these local wine grapes. He grows the red grapes Plavina and Lasina, in addition to the white grapes Debit and Marashtina, which he tells us about. There are old varieties that grow here for a few hundred years or even more. And probably these varieties are born in this area, so they are perfect in this environment, in this soil. So Debit is really grateful. You can produce from sparkling to sweet wine, but maybe it's the best like young, fresh, crisp wine that has really strong minerality in Plastivol. Marashtina is maybe better for production of heavy, complex wines. It was wine that you could find in pharmacy store before in the history, yes. Some doctors prescribed it like a medicine. Ante keeps opening the wines and gives us a few local snacks to try. It's like a cedar leaf on the cheek, he's like the ice cream, like it's ice cream. Marashtina is the same grape as Melvazia di Toscana. When done poorly, the wines can be bland, neutral and lacking acidity. Shereen hasn't always been convinced, but Ante opens up a few older vintages of his orange wine and white wine. Let's see if he can convince her. I feel spoiled by it, it has a lot of richness and depth and a very nice aroma. Honey wax is really nice, I wasn't expecting this. This is what we want from Marashtina. Another great Ante grows is Lassina. It makes light, low alcohol red wines and many call it the Pinot Noir of Dalmatia. Lassina is really a rare traditional variety, it grows only 50 km around the Scradin area. Reason is because it is really hard to grow, elegance. I think it's the best thing from Lassina, this elegance and also unusual flavor. Just down the road from Ante's slottage is Bibbage Winery. It's one of Croatia's most famous wineries, as nearly 50% of the wine is exported. The winery also hosted the late Anthony Bourdain during his No Reservations Coastal Croatia episode. It's the reason that we first visited the winery back in 2016. Ever since then, we've become close with the proprietor and winemaker Alan Bibbage. Alan's wife is a chef and does a spectacular tasting lunch and dinner during the tour of season. We're late for lunch, but Bibbage has prepared a few snacks for us. After tasting the new vintages, Alan takes us down to the cellar to show us a few more wines that are not yet released. We're leaving a drop of this, I'm going to drink it all. Alan has also worked with the great Babbage for years and tells us more about it. Babbage is, I'm not the best person, probably some guys from Primoshlady. They're better persons than me to speak about Babbage. Although we are producing Babbage here for centuries in Skradin area where we are right now. Babbage is one of them, as you know, one of the best Croatian red grapes. It's not very good grape for doing commercially in big vineyards. Lots of younger people are not working no more in the vineyards. Old people no more. The grape Alan is really passionate about is debit. Debit in my range. Debit is the major grape in this area, white grape. For so many years it was, how to say it was underestimated. My grandparents, grandfathers and everybody think and dream only about debit. So same with me. So when I started, my first mission was to recover the good name of debit. And I think that I'm doing this. If you could compare debit to one international grape, what would you say it's like? It's in the middle of everything and between everything. Oh, bravo. No, I have nothing to say. This is completely unity. Cheers. For the nightcap, we open an older vintage of Alan's top Merlot known as Sound Grill. It's big, rich and pomerol in style. Every time we come to Bibbage winery, we end up staying for hours on end, which sometimes tinkers with our schedule. This time we're smart and book an apartment nearby. In the morning we head to Bistro Arca at the Scradin Marina. They have what is rapidly known as the best per chute in Croatia. The owner also has a special recipe of Scradin risotto, which chefs Gordon Ramsay and the late Anthony Bordang go gaga over. Today they don't have any risotto made, but they do have the per chute. Finally. Okay, this may not be the risotto, but the soup and goulash is pretty darn good. Oh, yes. We wish we could stay here all afternoon, but we still have one more stop on a retour of Dalmatia. In the next episode, we'll take you to Hual and Brac Island, where some of the country's most renowned wine producers are found. Hey, did you know that the world's oldest continuously planted vineyard is in Croatia? That's right, trust us to take you there. What's a trip without some delicious local food? We've got you covered. What about Croatia and Croatian wine? Keep a lookout for our next episode and check out our book Cracking Croatian Wine.