My blog on Teuta’s work brought back memories from my childhood and youth. They are quite distinct; one relates to the best ever ice-cream, krempite, indianka, and lemonade, while the second one is complex, as it hails to the start of a difficult period in Kosovo’s history. Both memories converge at embeltore “Elida”.
The patisserie is housed in the “Pallati i Rinise”, the first shopping centre in Prishtine, built in the late ’70s, Elida became the epicentre of fashionable youth, intellectuals, and pillars of society during the ’80s. Everyone who was anyone went to Elida to see and be seen. If you were not there, you were the ’80s equivalent of “cancelled”. There was always a queue, absolutely always, and getting a table was akin to hitting the jackpot. So much was Elida part of Prishtina’s cultural life that the Ministry of Culture placed it in the list of temporary protected heritage in 2017.
My last visit was sometime in end of last year, when I took my girls there. I told them stories from my youth, convincing them I was a teenager once. We ended up ordering indianka (akin to Victoria sponge), ice-cream, krempite (millefeuille-topped thick custard), lemonade and boze. Now, boze is like nothing else you have tasted. Just like Marmite, you either love it or hate it.
A bit past its glory days, the interior being exactly as on the opening day, Elida is still going strong and is worth a visit for an old-fashioned cake and lemonade.
