Prague 2016 - The Great Monastery Restaurant

The Great Monastery (Strahov Monastery) is one of the main attractions in Prague. It is famous for the Theological Hall - a library completed in 1679 - with a magnificent Baroque ceiling. Unfortunately we did not have time to explore the monastery - as we were there mainly for lunch. The Monastery compound has been converted into a F&B venue - with many of the buildings turned into pubs, cafes and restaurants.

 The beautiful Theological Hall.

    Photo by Jorge Royan

Velka Klasterni Restaurace is a huge medieval-themed restaurant inside the Monastery complex. The restaurant is probably a bit of a tourist trap - but the dining hall has a vaulted ceiling and looks fairly impressive with solid timber tables and chairs. Large arched windows let in a lot of natural light.

It seems like roast whole pig is the restaurant's specialty. There were a number of pigs being prepared for roasting - and they have an impressive-looking rotisserie oven for roasting the pigs.

Lunch started with a vegetable soup that was delicious. The crescent shaped bread rolls looked a bit like croissants but were just plain bread rolls with a chewy texture. They were perfect for dunking into the soup.

Unfortunately we were not served the roast pig - but instead had roasted pork loin. You can see from the photo that it was a bit dry - but the sauce helped to save it, and the pickled purple cabbage was a nice accompaniment. Didn't quite like the dumplings which were essentially like white bread.

Dessert was a Kolache - a Czech spiral muffin filled with fruit jam.