A tiny sourdough bakery near the Golden Gate that sells out by early afternoon. Proper bread, burek, and the best breakfast pastry in Split for under three euros.
By Ana Kovač
Go before eleven. The sourdough loaf is the reason locals queue, but for a visitor the move is a slice of soparnik and a coffee standing up outside.
The sourdough loaf is the reason locals queue, and it sells out first. For a visitor, the move is a slice of soparnik — the chard and olive oil pie — and a coffee standing up outside, which is breakfast for under €5. The burek is the other morning staple, flaky and filled with cheese or meat, and it is better than the ones from the chain bakeries by a margin. The sweet pastries are worth a euro each and the problem is stopping at one.
Soparnik turns up again on the Split food tour, with the story of where it comes from.
Open from about 07:00 until it sells out, usually early afternoon — the sourdough goes first, the pastries go second, and by two there is bread left but not much else. Cash and card. There is no seating; you eat standing at the shelf by the window or on a bench outside, which is the local way.
The bakery is near the Golden Gate, where Gregory of Nin stands — rub the toe on your way past.
For fruit to go with it, the green market is at its best before nine.
Within a short walk.
History
Ninety minutes through the palace with a guide who lives inside it: the Golden Gate, the cellars, the Peristyle, the cathedral and the streets in between. Small group, no flag, and a proper explanation of why a Roman emperor retired to a cabbage patch in Dalmatia.
History
An eight-metre Meštrović bronze just outside the Golden Gate, of the bishop who fought to keep the liturgy in Croatian. Everyone rubs his big toe for luck, which is why it is the only polished part of him. Free, and takes five minutes.
Food & drink
The best ice cream in Split, made in small batches with real fruit and no artificial colours — which is why the pistachio is dull green and the strawberry is pale. Two euros a scoop and a queue that moves.
Food & drink
An hour and a half through Dalmatia's own grapes: plavac mali from Hvar and Pelješac, pošip and grk from Korčula, and the debit and maraština nobody exports. Most tastings run in palace cellars, which is a good place to be at three in the afternoon.
History
The oldest cathedral building in the world still in use, and it started life as the mausoleum of the emperor who persecuted the man it is now named after. The bell tower beside it gives you the best view in Split for the price of 183 steps.
Adventure
Three hours that get you round the palace, up Marjan and out along the coast without the climb. The electric assist is not laziness — it is the difference between seeing the top of the hill and reading about it.
Food & drink
Twelve seats at a counter, a blackboard that changes daily, and cooking that is better than places charging three times as much. No reservations, no table service, and a queue outside from seven. Worth the wait.
Food & drink
A small konoba on a Varoš side street doing exactly four things well: grilled fish by the kilo, black risotto, octopus salad and house wine from a jug. No view, no English menu board outside, and a queue by eight in July.
Food & drink
Three and a half hours through the green market, the fish market and four family-run places inside the palace, eating soparnik, pršut, Pag cheese, fresh anchovies and rožata. Enough food to replace lunch, with the context that makes Dalmatian cooking make sense.
Food & drink
A stone-walled konoba in an alley behind the Matejuška fishing harbour, doing straight Dalmatian seafood without a single flourish. Small, warm and consistently very good.
Food & drink
Split's best-known fine-dining seafood restaurant, on the first floor of the ACI marina with the whole harbour in front of it. Expensive, precise, and the view genuinely earns part of the bill.
Food & drink
The nine-until-midnight part of a Split night, and the best of it. Small cellars and side rooms inside Diocletian's Palace pour Dalmatian wine by the glass with no music you have to shout over. Arrive before nine if you want a table, and leave around midnight when the lanes empty.