If you ever wonder what happens when tradition, history and hospitality fuse together in perfect harmony, we got the answer.
One of a kind Hotel Museum Puntijar made our carefully selected list of top hotels in Zagreb. Keep reading to find out why!
Intriguing history of Zagreb, Croatia and the Puntijar family comes together in the northern part of the Zagreb city. At the foothills of Medvednica in the green surroundings of Gračani, Puntijar family offers one of the most amazing time traveling experiences in Croatia and perhaps the whole Europe.
The Puntijar legacy
The Puntijar family is deeply proud of their 175 years tradition of hospitality.
The noble owner, papa Zlatko inherited the great appreciation of the history and tradition from his ancestors and poured all of his long-time dedication into the Hotel Museum Puntijar. His father very much enjoyed photography and took his camera everywhere leaving numerous photograph clues to his descendants. The halls of the hotel are decorated with more than 700 paintings, photographs and original news articles providing each and every guest with a unique experience of learning about the historical stories of Zagreb, Croatia and the Puntijar family.
Walking the hotel is truly a magnificent experience. In the basements you can find exhibits regarding Croatian sport, ground floor focuses on the history of Zagreb, while the first floor mainly has exhibits of Croatian history. The top, second floor combines all three floors themes with the history of Puntijar family and the correlation between.
The hotel has 34 spacious rooms all with a different style and name. Each room is decorated withdelicately restored antique furniture for an authentic experience. Ground floor rooms are themed and named after famous Croatian kings, dukes and rulers, first floor rooms have names of Zlatko’s children and the rooms on the second floor are named after the Puntijar anchestors.
Gastronomy museum
The Puntijar family is very well familiar with the great responsibility that comes with abundant heritage; that responsibility being the blessed opportunity to represent the immense resources at their disposal. Exploring history and collecting rare and fascinating items goes hand in hand with exploration of the archaic gastronomy. Preserving all kinds of historical heritage resulted in truly admiring family legacy.
Integral part of the “Stari Puntijar” restaurant is The Gastronomy museum with the largest cookbook collection in Europe. About 2500 old cookbooks found home in the museum along with some really impressive examples.
One of the most interesting editions is the “Wiener Kochbuch“, the smallest cookbook in the world, printed around 1905 in Vienna. According to gathered information, there are only four copies. The specificity of cookbooks are its dimensions, it is only 2 × 2 centimeters, and in it lies a whopping 100 recipes.
Anyone interested in Gastronomy will be mesmerized with this museum and the journey through the history of Croatian national cuisine. There you can find various old-fashioned cooking tools such as icebox fridge, ice cream machine and old salami cutter and different kinds of cutlery and dishware.
Monumental atmosphere
Well-educated, professional and friendly staff of the hotel warmly welcomes each guest. Among many dignitaries the hotel has welcomed, they are mostly proud of serving Pope John Paul II on two occasions. The very same cutlery he was served is exhibited in the museum along with the menu. There are around 1000 menus displayed on the walls of the museum.
In the restaurant “Stari Puntijar” you can try the signature dessert – apple dumplings in red wine sauce that are made following an old recipe from the first printed cookbook on Croatian language from 1813 that is a part of the museum collection.
Enchanting treasure chest
The wine house in the basement that dates from 1925 had numerous barrels lying around until the Puntijar family redecorated it into a wine shop. There you can find all sorts of authentic wines and sparkling wines that are usually opened with a saber.
The Hotel Museum is really a crown project of everything the Puntijars love and invest time and energy in. Highly exclusive and extravagant this rare hotel complex is designed to take you on a learning journey full of excitement and discovery. It would probably take several weeks for a visitor to thoroughly explore the museum, the wine house, the cookbooks, the menus and even the library with the most prominent titles of European literature but coming here is so worth it.
Any history lover will feel at home and enjoy every corner of this complex, delving into small details and relish scents from the kitchen.
It is very obvious on first visit that the Hotel Museum Puntijar is a joined labor of love, family and great appreciation for the past. Staying in this hotel allows you to embark on an unforgettable venture of time travelling through the past while serving your taste buds with attentive cuisine and exquisite flavors.
Are you a collector?
Do you enjoy studying history and gastronomy?
Do you have a great appreciation of your inheritance?
Would you like to visit Hotel Museum Puntijar?
Author: Nikolina Dukić
Photo credit: Hotel Puntijar
