Semper Liberi

Seven, like the house number and the Slovenian expression (Sedem!) for sitting down to eat. In a modern and welcoming setting with an open kitchen, students from the town's tourism and hospitality school take their first steps, supported by experienced and consolidated staff. The result is a gastronomic offering that revisits local dishes, with occasional international influences, which can be chosen freely from the à la carte menu or as part of a tasting menu.

If you’re exploring Maribor, this restaurant is a great place to stop and take a break and has a real holiday feel with its spacious terrace boasting views of the town, the Drava river and the Pohorje mountains in the distance. The menu focuses on fish from the Adriatic (including shellfish and plenty of grilled options), as well as meat recipes that include grass-fed Slovenian beef. There’s a more concise menu at lunchtime, plus a café and the sky lounge, both of which are perfect settings in which to relax.

On the outskirts of Maribor, Mak is the eccentric and fiercely individual restaurant of chef-patron David Vračko. The spaces, distributed across two rooms, combine eclectic furnishings with a deliberately understated table setting. Here there is no menu: the chef leads guests through a surprise journey, a kind of culinary performance made up of creative, colourful and at times unconventional dishes. The cuisine, contemporary and original, celebrates local ingredients with great imagination, through unusual textures and bold combinations, for an experience that is lively and outside the ordinar

Nestled in an idyllic setting, the restaurant is reached by crossing gently rolling hills until you discover a charming 16th-century building, once home to the Benedictine monks who started the winemaking business. Today, the winemaking tradition continues, accompanied by tasting itineraries in which the chef interprets local ingredients in a contemporary key, all in the evocative setting of the antique brick-vaulted cellars.