Although I am in Latvia for many years already, I’ve never heard a single word, nor even a semi-word about this place.

Each year thousands of orange-yellow postcards from the autumn Sigulda fill facebook and instagram with its glossy stream, but all of them keep silent about this place.

As if they had a conspiracy against it.

Therefore, when the given “chalet” over a pond jumped out from behind a turn, and all of a sudden started to flicker on the right behind the car window, it was only my gastro-sniff-radar that sounded the alarm:

“Pull over! There’re still 3 whole hours before the plane. We’ll make it through!” it yelled wildly.

And as usual, there was no mistake.

We enter: hey there, what’s up? There’s a terem, a tall one, with no embellishment – it has a very authentic look. As they say now – it’s “craft” and immediately an anecdote about homosexuals come to the mind, but in a good sense of the word. The same is here.

Everything is fucking authentic.

Now I regret that I didn’t order tartare. I thought it’d be some trash ‘cause the menu resembled the ones in VDNKh cafes with all sorts of “salads with crayfish meat,” etc. This is a big problem – people often do so: they throw a fucking awesome restaurant, but their menu is just like from another dimension; like flowers in cellophane.

Another fact about the menu: BRAVELY share your main course, because to eat it alone is a nightmare, but not to eat it is a crime.

Further on everything was simple and at the same time spectacular.

First, the legendary Lithuanian herring with curd cheese (c) – it turned out to be a Baltic version of salmon with sour cream: curd cheese with herbs and mild-cured fish, also with some potatoes – just perfect.

Then there was a real hit, called (sorry, forgot the name) – barley with bacon in sauce and with sauce on the side.

And after that there came some crazy brutal stuff: it was nothing like the nice light cute stewing but a real anatomical theatre: hare leg the size of a chicken, corresponding boar and deer steaks + some complicated side dishes: huge black beans, all sorts of sprouts, etc.

This is the exact way of game meat serving that I’ve always been looking for: neither ragout nor nano-steak, nor some other fashionable fancy shit; but almost like the true “Three Musketeers” kind of thing à la broche.

And everything’s made super deliciously, really.

Come over and go for a walk in the park for the whole day. And then, after experiencing the autumn, or frost, or a summer sea thing – just go straight there.