Njeguši pršut, the ham that tastes of sea air and mountains

If you’ve had Parma ham or Spanish jamón, Njeguši pršut will feel familiar and unfamiliar at once. Familiar because it’s a cured ham sliced thin and eaten with bread and cheese; unfamiliar because it’s smoked, and beech smoke changes the flavour completely. For me it’s one of those foods you should try where it’s made, and that means a stony plateau high above the Bay of Kotor.

How it’s cured and smoked

The National Tourism Organisation puts it simply. Njeguški pršut is smoked exclusively over beech wood and the meat cures for six months before it reaches your plate. The secret, it says, is Njeguši’s climate, where winds rising from the sea meet the mountain air and give it a distinctive aroma. The same source tells a legend about a king so fond of the local pršut that the Montenegrin phrase for eating like a king is said to come from it.

The Cetinje tourist board adds that pršut is still the most important product of Njeguši, and on its national cuisine page calls the ham and cheese of Lovćen an unforgettable pairing.

The cheese and the kastradina

Pršut never comes alone. Njeguši cheese has as much history behind it. The Cetinje tourist board says it was sold in Kotor, along the coast, in Dalmatia, Trieste, Venice, Marseille and even Malta, and the National Tourism Organisation lists smoked Njeguši cheese among those on its food routes, alongside aged Pljevlja cheese and Kolašin’s layered lisnati. The third piece is kastradina, dried mutton, which the local source rates alongside the other two.

On its Cetinje page the National Tourism Organisation sketches the whole local table, with pršut made to traditional recipes, cow’s milk cheese left to dry in the open air for two months before it’s eaten, forest honey, wine and brandy. It also suggests booking a visit to a local household to watch a traditional Montenegrin meal being cooked from start to finish, and nothing would teach you more about where this ham comes from.

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Where to try it

The best place is the village itself, at the stone houses with konobas along the Kotor to Cetinje road, with a board of pršut, cheese and bread. You get there up the Kotor serpentine or from Cetinje on the Lovćen road.

If you don’t pass through Njeguši, you’ll find it on restaurant platters across the country, and the Šipčanik wine cellar near Podgorica serves home-cured pršut with Njeguši cheese on the bruschetta in one of its tasting programmes.

What I can’t promise

Neither the National Tourism Organisation nor the Cetinje tourist board says, in what I’ve read, whether the pršut or the cheese holds a protected designation, so I’m not claiming it. I’m not giving prices either, as there are no official ones. For everything else on the Montenegrin table, see my guide to Montenegro food.

If you are short on time, see the best tours in Cetinje and pick one that fits your day.

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