This time I want to tell you about a very nice traditional Bulgarian restaurant with an unpronounceable name, situated in the heart of Sofia, near the pedestrian Vitosha street. Even if you’ve mastered the Cyrillic alphabet and have no problem reading things, the name “Hadjidraganovite Izbi” is still really hard to pronounce, so don’t bother doing that, and check out the restaurant instead!
You can probably imagine the décor of a traditional Bulgarian restaurant: nice wooden tables and benches (or sometimes chairs), beautiful embroideries on the walls and clay pots with ornaments as decorations. “Hadjidraganovite Izbi” is exactly like that, and it is absolutely charming, so if it is your first time in Sofia you really have to go there, and not just for the food.
The restaurant has a ground floor and an underground floor, so if you are coming for dinner, I strongly advise you to book a table downstairs. A second piece of advice – don’t come alone, because you just won’t be able to try all the interesting food the restaurant has to offer. In fact, you should take at least 2 or 3 more friends with you, because there are some very nice assorted salads in the menu (you can see them in the pictures) of almost 2 kilos, and a huge dish with different kinds of grilled meat, called “Voevodska Sofra” that weighs approximately 5 kilos (you can see it in the pictures as well). That’s why there’s just no point of coming alone and taking individual portions – you simply won’t be able to try as many different kinds of traditional Bulgarian food all by yourself.
For me this restaurant was full of surprises for many reasons. Some of the food was served in a very unusual way, there were musicians playing old songs that most of Bulgarians apparently knew, so they sang along. But the most incredible thing was when during one of the songs people just took each other hands and formed a circle around the musicians for the traditional “Horo” dance. Trust me, it is worth seeing, because even if you are not dancing, or don’t know the lyrics of the songs to sing along, it still feels like you are a part of some big family celebration somewhere in a tiny village hidden in the mountains of Bulgaria.
A little reminder: you really have to book a table, if you want to come in the evening, because “Hadjidraganovite Izbi” is always full at dinnertime. The good thing is – since the restaurant has a central location, you can just stop by during the day and book your table for the evening. And don’t forget that it should be downstairs!
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Reviewed by:
Maria