I was on a business trip to Bjeljina, a city in Bosnia and Herzegovina, related to the supervision of a warehouse construction project.
When my colleagues, the hosts, asked me what I would like for breakfast, I told them: "Let it be of your choice, as long as it is not too fatty and salty".
Not long after, a wrapped, hot cheese pie prepared under the stove was waiting for me in the kitchen on the table.
The smell of the packaged pie hinted that the taste was fantastic.
And at the first bite, as soon as the pie touched my palate, I remembered our last stay in Bijeljina.
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A few years ago, returning from Jahorina, my wife, her sister, my sister and I, we stopped in Bijeljina and walked around the city center.
We knew what we were looking for, we just had no success.
We tried to find a store where we, four of us, had eaten pie more than 10 years ago...
We then remembered an incident from a trip 10 years ago, when we bought a pie to take home, but due to a stoppage on the road, we ate the pie before we got home.
Then we ate it directly from the paper spread on the hood of the car.
The last time we were looking for that pie store, which makes pies with various fillings and bakes them under the "Sač", we didn't manage to find it and we ate the pie in another one.
No, it wasn't the same taste.
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This pie that I have now ate, the taste reminded me of the one from 10 years ago.
When I finished the meeting and got into the car, I typed the address from the pie wrapper into the navigation and started searching.
I found the address easily. The "Buregdžinica Šampion" was in the same part of the city as the one from 10 years ago.
When I stepped inside, on the right side I saw a large hearth with lined vessels for "Sač", as well as the embers under which the sach is prepared.
Well, it's the same one...
The saleswoman looked at me in amazement and asked why I find that hair interesting, when I look at it like that.
I told her the story (the one above), 10 years ago. as well as this one with an unsuccessful search.
She smiled and said: "Well, it's no wonder why you didn't find us at the old address three years ago, that old barracks was demolished and a residential building was built on it, and we moved 200m away with this Sač and recipes".
We laughed together as I chose which pie to pack for me to take away.
"Burek" (with meat), pie with cheese, pie with greens and pie with zucchini...
A little bit of everything.
As soon as I sat in the car, I called my wife to gather the company, the four of us who were actors in the pie story from ten years ago.
When I got home, the guests were there.
I warmed the pie in the oven and with conversations and reminiscing about that period of our lives, we enjoyed well-known tastes....
This was #TBT in which, after delicious pies, I sat contentedly in the armchair and chatted with my family long into the night.
