Demikát

The story

Demikát is a bryndzová polievka, a Slovak soup of bryndza, the soft, salty sheep's cheese that also goes into bryndzové halušky. Its exact origin is not known, but the Slovak news site Startitup notes that it was cooked mainly in the regions where sheep were kept, and describes it as a soup of bryndza enriched with sweet cream and eggs. Cooks disagree about the details. A blogger for The Slovak Spectator found versions served with toasted bread cubes, onion or ham, and noted that, unlike bryndzové halušky, demikát is missing from the menus of most Slovak restaurants. The soup still wins prizes in the Podpoľanie region. At the eighth Tradičná chuť Podpoľania cooking contest in Slatinské Lazy, in the Detva district, in June 2019, a two-person team from Lieskovec near Zvolen won with a demikát made by frying onion, bacon and potatoes together before adding bryndza mixed with cream, the state news agency TASR reported. The name traveled beyond the kitchen: in the 1980s, a Slovak progressive rock band called itself Marián Greksa & Demikát. It is a 40-minute soup, so serve it as a quick weeknight lunch with rye bread, or in small cups before a roast.