Croatian Airport Delights and Salami for Days

On our last day in Croatia, Paulina and I didn’t think to plan our eats before we took the bus to the airport, three hours early. “Eh,” we thought. “We’ll just grab something there.” Never have more ominous words been spoken. Dramatic. Besides, what were we going to do? Grab another massive roll from the Konzum supermarket with some more cold cuts from the omnipresent deli counter?

As much as we loved salami sandwiches and keeping portion prices under $2.00 a serving, we had eaten this meal every day for 10 days already.

We ate it for lunch that day.

Even the night before, when we decided to treat ourselves to dinner out at a place called “Wines and Snack,” we ended up ordering… you guessed it… a cold cuts plate. With a giant, cut-up roll.

The following day, we flew out of Split after taking the rocky 6 AM morning ferry from Korcula. One of us got very nauseous and almost lost her breakfast of Light ‘n Crisp Wasa Crackers topped with cream cheese and orange marmalade. There was a big difference between the movements of a car ferry and the movements of a high speed catamaran.

We shared this quaint ‘n pleasant ride with 300 other passengers:

A little cramped, but cultural differences, etc.

I’m not sure why I am reviewing an airport restaurant (the only restaurant at the airport, Restaurant Ikar), but I took pictures! Is this not the ethos of the inexperienced food blogger? Buuuuuttttt I toook piccccctures.

We lingered languidly luxuriously all lalala over the menu for what seemed like a quarter of an hour before we decided that our money would be best spent on a large plate of spaghetti bolognese for 30 Kuna, two different slices of tarts (20 Kuna each), and two different kinds of cherry liqueurs (16 Kuna each). “They’re local,” I told my sister, most importantly. “Local booze. That’s why it’s cheaper.” Okay, whatever, dork. Just pick something.

Our plate of pasta arrived mere moments after the ticket hit the kitchen, a glorious rendition of Barilla and what appeared to be jarred meat sauce with water poured in to streeeetttch the ole sauce trick.

We were so excited to be out at a restaurant, even the restaurant at the airport, that we just cleared the hell up out of that plate.

We washed it all down (what a terrible euphemism) with the previously mentioned cherry liqueurs, and two hours later, we went through security.

You can imagine our surprise when we walked through the metal detectors and saw a row of shops and restaurants stretched out before us, our soft, astonished steps parting a sea of obvious tourist-driven civilization. Oh dear God. Despite my most delusional fantasies, Croatia was not exactly the undiscovered last frontier of Europe, especially not at the airport. We were not breaking new ground as American tourists. We were not going to get a Croatian Authenticity Badge for eating at the only restaurant at the airport.

But we were going to get entire rows to ourselves on EasyJet, which was pretty awesome, even just for a two hour flight.