Our story

The story of the Ábrahám Inn takes us to a journey through time.

József Ábrahám Senior opened the first pub in the first café in the area in 1939. The first patrons were those fruit and vegetable farmers who took their produce to the Subotica market in horse-drawn carriages, and set out as early as 2 am. The building by the main road was in everyone’s way, so there were many people who took their first morning fruit brandy here. Since this was the place where they had the best wine and soda water ratio for spritzer, the Inn had a lot of patrons in the afternoons as well.

Ferenc Ábrahám took over the business in 1960s, and he expanded the café to a restaurant. In the beginning, only two dishes were on the menu- chicken stew and fried carp, but there were also homemade smoked sausages and winter salami to go with wine. Ábrahám Inn was open only during the day. The hardworking inn keeper from Palić could not tolerate late night revelries and debauchery. The following saying is attributed to him: “If you can't make money for your daily bread during the day, you won't make it during the night”. And he lived by it. In his opinion, people came to eat well and not to revel, so if there was no music, the focus would be on the food. When people asked him why there was no music in the Inn, he gave a witty answer- “It is because the fork and the knife play all the music here”.

The following successor from the family tree was József Ábrahám Junior, and he was the one who renovated the building in way to accommodate to today’s requests, and also, he expanded the menu.

The male members of the Ábrahám family were great gourmets and were very skilful in the preparation of meat. They were convinced that only waiters, i.e. men, were able to serve and present food in a dignified manner. The management still upholds this tradition.

The leading role in the kitchen was always delegated to the wives. The female members of the Ábrahám family made very few appearances among the guests. However, they were the ones responsible for the success of the Inn because there is no good restaurant if the food is not good.

From the beginning the menu included traditional family recipes. One of the signature dishes of the Inn is the veal head goulash, and it is attributed to one of the loving great-grandmothers, Rozália. She was the one who made this speciality made from veal head and legs for the first time. We have the following generation to thank for this dish making it on to the menu, namely grandma Borbála.

Ábrahám Inn is a place which cherishes tradition and would rather stick to the family recipes than to introduce dishes and flavours from other countries. One of the basic principles they go by is that only fresh, high quality food characteristic for this region can make it to the table.

The fourth generation is now managing the restaurant, and they are doing everything in their power to be worthy of the recognition the Inn has received so far. It is as if they can feel the gaze of their forebears while they are preparing the dishes. Due to that, while we are eating the specialities of the Ábrahám Inn, we can get to know the atmosphere and the values of this region.