The event, firstly organized in Maribor as a part of the European Capital of Culture project, last year spread throughout Slovenia. The organizers of the project in Slovenia, Violeta and her husband Uroš Mencinger, the culinary critic for Nedelo, got the idea from abroad where Restaurant Weeks are already well established.

Lately it seems more and more emphasize is given to food – more and more top restaurants are being opened, Odprta kuhna (Open kitchen) became a must on Fridays, the Restaurant Week is sold out… What are the reasons for that, in your opinion, especially considering that everybody is talking about crisis and saving?

Obviously more and more people are becoming aware, and that thanks to the crisis, that a new car, a new TV set, a new brand do not bring true satisfaction – but we can delight in good food day after day. Therefore more and more people discover the difference between eating, and eating well. The Restaurant Week is an ideal opportunity to do just that!

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Is the Restaurant Week about eating only, or also about socializing? Finally a great number of people decided to go out, they are making arrangements for lunches, they are getting together with friends, talking …

By all means. A favourable price is just an incentive to explore, get to know something new, travel around Slovenia, and enjoy. A new movement is arising in Slovenia – the Goodeater Movement.

The Restaurant Week in Slovenia seems to be a great success. Do you see anything else we are missing, while other capitals (or states) have – speaking of cuisine?

Thank you. We have a lot of plans. The Restaurant Week will continue to develop, and we are preparing other projects. We'll be able to tell more about them in autumn.

Which are the greatest still untapped Slovenian potential as far as food/culinary trends/events are concerned?

We, the guests, are the greatest potential. We need to learn a lot, and to get to know a lot. Goodeating is a culture we have already started to get to know. And that is the essence of our new project.

How did the selection of the participating restaurants go this year? Zemono is absent this year, but it will participate in autumn, you said. Franko House never participates, but perhaps some other restaurants show their interest in participating?

Zemono decided to participate in autumn, while for Franko House they believe to be too remote to participate in such an event. I certainly disagree, I am sure they would have a full house nine days in a row. For each event some new restaurant will join us, but we will always insist on quality. Only such restaurants can participate which we had visited, and evaluated in Nedelo, and which earn 'four suns' for their special menu. Of course a lot of restaurants show interest, and we will have to visit quite a few before autumn.

Do you notice large differences between restaurants, and how they adapt their menus to the Restaurant Week? Do some have smaller portions, or use cheaper ingredients?

The differences are smaller than expected. Everybody is trying very hard, and they offer a lot – some much more than 14 Euros' worth. Everybody can make the calculation. You need to work hard for a good name. I doubt you can save by reducing the portions. And then, the guests coming during the Restaurant Week are more critical, more likely to estimate, compare, exchange impressions, pictures… The restaurants compete among themselves. No wonder some chefs are quite jealous of goodeaters – they would also like to travel around during that week, and get to know the competition in Slovenia. We might change something to make it possible.

Were a lot of suggestions regarding the menus needed? You were not satisfied with Podvin offering only 'country feast', so they added fish menu which in the end prevailed…

We do give some suggestions if we feel the direction is wrong. But chefs themselves do the checking of menus of the other chefs after they are published on the web, and consequently some change their original menus, and make them even better.

As expected, the first to be sold out were the most prestigious restaurants (JB, Maxim, Strelec...), but it should be said that they substantially reduced the number of available places for the Restaurant Week. Which is your silent favourite?

Unfortunately we can't visit all the restaurants. Anyway, during the Restaurant Week we leave the grading to others. But there are 69 silent favourites on the list, and a large number of guests already know that the most famous usually also means the best.

The selection was yours; what can we learn from it? Which parts of Slovenia are still lacking culinary-wise, where there is still potential, which region is waking up, which has fallen asleep?

The Notranjska region has only one representative, the same goes for the Koroška region. Ljubljana participates with the largest number (17), as expected, Styria has a great number of participants (20) also because the Restaurant Week was born during the European Capital of Culture project, and especially here we can find the proof that the best don't give up in spite of the crisis. The Primorska region (12) has known better times, and here we see the largest potential. Only three participate from the Prekmurje region, in the Lower Carniola they do good work (7), and the Upper Carniola keeps strong in spite of the fluctuation of chefs (8).