Pašticada Fest

In late June, the Petrovac waterfront is given over to a single dish: pašticada, the slow-cooked festive beef of the coastal tradition, honoured with its own festival — Pašticada Fest.

Petrovac is the calm counterpoint to Budva's bustle: a small bay town wrapped around a sandy beach, a short stone promenade, pines on the headlands and a little fortress guarding the harbour. Its scale is exactly right for a festival like this one — the whole event fits along the seafront, and nobody hurries.

Pašticada is the coast's celebration dish — beef slow-cooked for hours until it is meltingly tender, the meal families reserve for weddings and feast days. At the festival, both restaurants and households prepare their versions, and visitors taste their way along the waterfront comparing family recipes that are guarded like heirlooms.

That is the festival's quiet drama: a dish normally cooked behind closed doors for the biggest family occasions, brought out into the open. Ask how long each pot simmered and you will get proud, precise and mutually contradictory answers — the surest sign of a living tradition. Tasting several versions side by side, you begin to understand what the arguments are about, and to form loyalties of your own.

Music along the promenade and activities for kids round the day out, giving the whole event the feel of a town celebration rather than a food fair. Petrovac itself — red-roofed, pine-scented, facing the open sea — is at its early-summer best.

Entry is free. Late June brings warm swimming water without the July crowds, and the festival makes a perfect anchor for a day trip down the riviera from Budva: beach in the morning, tastings through the afternoon, promenade music into the evening.