A guide to Na nože season 3: every restaurant and its story

Na nože season 3 (2024): twelve restaurants and the first real knives

Season three of Na nože took Martin Novák to twelve restaurants across the whole of Slovakia and even over the border into the Czech Republic, from Banská Bystrica through Prešov, Humenné and Poprad all the way to Czech Frýdek-Místek. Unlike season one, here Martin handed out knives in full and the verdicts were uncompromising: there were two clean zeros and three four-knife transformations. Martin's average rating for the season is 2.67 knives, while the public gives these venues an average of 4.16 out of 5 on Google. One restaurant has not made it in the meantime and is now closed. Here is the whole third season, restaurant by restaurant, and what really went on behind the kitchen doors.

Pizza Pub Tank (Banská Bystrica)

The third season opened on the Fončorda estate in Banská Bystrica, where Pizza Pub Tank had been running for twelve years without knowing whether it was an Italian restaurant, a pizzeria or a pub. It is run by Marcela, a former model, but the kitchen was held up by her seventy-eight-year-old mother, who came to cook from five in the morning and took no wages. On his first visit Martin got a lukewarm soup, collapsed pizza dough, a bagged salad with a homemade "French" dressing of ketchup and mustard, and waited a full hour for the ribs. Of nine dishes only the Moravian sparrow won him over.

Martin called in his friend Vincenzo from Naples to show them proper dough, slimmed the pizza card down to ten kinds and added Italian dishes Slovaks know, from a parmesan schnitzel to a creamy garlic soup. The biggest win was that Marcela finally proved to her mother she could run the place alone, and after the reset the restaurant filled up. A small black mark, an unfinished pizza card and an old drinks list, kept him from giving more. Rating: Martin gave 3 knives, Google 3.9/5.

Retro Burger & Dinner (Prešov)

The second episode took Martin to Prešov, right by the station, where the 1950s-style American diner Retro Burger & Dinner stands. The place had been closed for two years and after reopening was losing around three thousand euros a month. The broth was watery and the celery cubes hard, "I almost broke a tooth," the penne was overcooked, and the cook used up expensive gorgonzola meant for the burgers in the cheese sauce. What angered Martin most was a ready-made chicken burger for eight euros. A row over lies about the rice ended with owner Eva firing her only cook on the spot.

Martin shifted the place from a plain burger joint to a full diner with food from soup to dessert, lit up the sign so it could be seen from the road, and added an apple pie that won him over completely: "I don't know when I last ate such a good apple pie." A month on the burger was juicy and not oversalted, and the transformation into a working diner earned 3 knives. The restaurant Retro Burger & Dinner is, however, now closed and no longer operates, so we do not recommend visiting it. Rating: Martin gave 3 knives, Google 4.4/5. The venue is now closed.

Mestská piváreň (Humenné)

In Humenné, on Námestie slobody, Martin ran into a place with a split identity, Mestská piváreň, which was at the same time a Vincenzo pizzeria. The interesting twist was that he was called not by the owner but by waiter Stano, who had spent four years trying in vain to change something. From a menu of fifty-two items came a pale pizza with sliced cheese "like plaster inside," a dried-out boneless knuckle and a burger that looked "like something you'd toss into a pig's trough." Almost everything came from an opened bag: "I drove five hundred kilometres for ready-made food."

Martin persuaded owner Andrej to stop competing over pizza with five other pizzerias on the square and gave the place an honest pub identity with ten dishes. The star became a corn dog made from their own sausages from local butcher Mrs Rebejová, "it's something that's only yours." The kitchen took a huge step from reheating bags to honest cooking, but the food still needs its flavour fine-tuned and above all the owners must sort out their relationships. Rating: Martin gave 3 knives, "so you still have somewhere to go," Google 4.2/5.

Hostinec Raj (Hrabušice)

The fourth episode was unusual, because Hostinec Raj in the heart of Slovak Paradise had both the food and the footfall in order. The restaurant serves an honest homemade lunch menu of six dishes for an unbelievable 5.50 euros and handles up to 270 lunches a day. The chicken broth, the štefanská and the bryndza halušky were excellent, "a massacre for 5.50," and Martin openly admitted he didn't understand why he had even been called. The problem was not in the kitchen but in a broken team: the experienced cooks, led by Slávka who has cooked here for 23 years, felt owner Marian favoured his son Lukáš.

Since the food needed no changing, Martin turned to the people and the machines, taught the women to work the expensive combi oven and sent them for a massage and a flight over the village to honour their lifetime of hard work. This time he gave the sticker not to the owner but to the women in the kitchen, who in his view are the true heart of the place: "These 4 knives are proof that the food is genuinely good." Rating: Martin gave 4 knives, Google 4.5/5.

Stupavská Hodovňa (Stupava)

Just outside Bratislava, in Stupava, Martin stopped at the restaurant Hodovňa, which locals knew for years under the name Umelónka. The place had been taken over three months earlier by entrepreneur Sergej for the sake of his girlfriend Viktória, who as both manager and waitress was only 24. The cauliflower soup was oversalted and its dumplings slimy, the "spaghetti" was overcooked noodles in oil and the tuna came from a tin: "I'd never come here again in my life, because it was horrendous." The dishes were invented by Sergej, who had no clue about hospitality.

Martin kept the name Hodovňa and gave it meaning, "where you eat well," building the identity on honest, hearty feasting, from meat in the broth with horseradish to roast suckling pig. The biggest shift came from Viktória herself, who finally got the managerial knack and began to lead the people. "If I'd come here for the menu, I'd leave satisfied," Martin concluded. Rating: Martin gave 3 knives, Google 3.7/5.

California Pub (Ružomberok)

In Ružomberok, on the Klačno estate, Martin found the California Pub, named that way because the owner of the premises lives in California. It is run by Lukáš Ivanov, who after thirteen years in England spontaneously launched his own place and even sold his flat to do it. In the empty restaurant nobody came for ten minutes, the menu listed 65 dishes, the pizza had raw dough, and after an hour and twenty minutes came soggy potatoes and rubbery fusilli reheated in the microwave. "The tragedy of Slovak gastronomy continues," Martin remarked, calling the place "a little microwave kingdom."

Martin opened Lukáš's eyes with a stress test of twenty guests, which the cook failed alone, and built the place on a concept of events, retro nights, a karaoke stage and singer Eva Mazíková as a musical guest. The biggest leap was made by Lukáš's wife Alenka, who began to genuinely coordinate the place, and a month on California had come alive with balls and a Valentine's menu. Martin reminded them, though, that a long road still lies ahead. Rating: Martin gave 2 knives, Google 3.8/5.

VEG (Poprad)

In snowy Poprad Martin searched for the vegetarian restaurant VEG, which nobody on the street had ever heard of: "Poprad seems very meat-eating." The place sat in a dark basement cellar with no daylight, and owner Denis, a vegetarian and former IT worker, had dropped down to only a lunch menu and into the red by around 75 thousand euros. The soup looked "like water from a washing machine," the broccoli gratin got zero points and the Indian bhaji was raw inside. The one bright spot was a fresh, colourful samosa: "This is how I imagine vegetarian food, fresh, lively."

Martin named that the problem was not just the food but the energy, and that the submissive Denis was the anchor dragging the place down. He fitted windows with a view of the Tatras into the cellar, added a new logo and built a colourful, modern menu that appeals to meat-eaters too, from roasted carrot with carrot-top pesto to spinach gnocchi with burrata. A month on the black cellar had become a lively, bright restaurant, and the 3 knives were mainly for Denis having reignited the fire within himself. Rating: Martin gave 3 knives, Google 4.5/5.

Pekidors (Michal na Ostrove)

On the Žitný ostrov, by a fishing pond in Michal na Ostrove, Martin was tempted by the idea of a romantic lakeside spot, but reality let him down. The restaurant Pekidors, whose name comes from the names of owner Peter's family, was held together by a freezer Martin called a "treasure chest," where every day the unsold food was packed away and then simply reheated. A 28-euro steak was overcooked and drenched in a powdered sauce "all MSG," the fish was ice cold and the game was drowned in half a litre of pumpkin oil. Asked whether he would return for any of the five dishes, his answer was plain: "Not one."

Martin took the young head chef Lajoš to his own restaurant Sogo, turned the space into a romantic venue and built a modern menu of duck breast and chestnut risotto. But the big night failed on character: when the chestnut soup ran out, owner Peter, instead of ordering more, watered it down with cream and sent it to guests. "You don't rob customers," Martin declared, and chef Lajoš took off his apron and walked out in protest. Precisely because the owner chose profit over honesty, the place got 0 knives despite the beautiful transformation. Rating: Martin gave 0 knives, Google 4.5/5.

Penzión & Řízkárna VERANDA (Frýdek-Místek)

Martin crossed the border into Czech Frýdek-Místek, where the couple Michal and Míša had run Penzión & Řízkárna VERANDA for six years, a pub built on a single idea, schnitzels. But those very schnitzels were no good: underseasoned and unevenly fried, three side by side looked as if each had come back from a different holiday, one from Africa, one from Egypt, the third from Scandinavia. "Salt first, salt second, salt third," Martin summed up, and of the five schnitzels he would eat at most one.

Martin convinced Michal that the schnitzel-house concept was dead and built the menu on what Slovaks and Czechs have in common, on spreads, brawn, a Viennese sirloin and above all potato pierogi with bryndza as a tribute to Míša's Slovak roots, "not even a Slovak would be ashamed of these pierogi." Right after he left, the team locked up, gathered over the weekend and launched the new menu on Monday, so Veranda finally came alive. Rating: Martin gave 4 knives, Google 4.2/5.

Penzión Janošík (Ždiar)

In the village of Ždiar beneath the Belianske Tatras stands the family-run Penzión Janošík, frozen in the nineties, whose clientele is almost entirely ski trips and outdoor schools. Martin had lunch with the children here and was immediately put off by a dirty plate, a paprika "water" instead of soup and undercooked cabbage flat noodles. He was most horrified by what the children drink, reading cyclamate, saccharin and monosodium glutamate off the labels, a "young chemists' club." Owner Rado bought the cheapest ingredients, and Martin pushed through a rise in the daily rate from seven to fifteen euros.

Young cook Vlado got a chance and prepared deep-fried ice cream renamed Jánošík's balls, but on the big night, under pressure, he threw his apron and walked out, something Martin had not seen in over twenty years of practice. A month on, a new cook named Aurel was at the stove and the food was again a disaster, broth with no taste, bitter bread and every third grain of rice raw. Martin could not honour this kitchen with any sticker at all. Rating: Martin gave 0 knives, Google 3.6/5.

Silvanus (Kremnica)

In Kremnica, one of the oldest mining towns in Slovakia, the hunting restaurant Silvanus sits right on the main square. The venison dishes here were honest and well balanced, clearly made by someone who cooks from the heart, but the service was pure comedy: "The biggest paradox of this restaurant is that they have damp walls but bring my food in white gloves." The real bomb waited in the storerooms, eleven full fridges and roughly eight thousand euros of food. "You're a hamster," Martin erupted at owner Mišo, who wrote a brand-new daily menu every morning.

Martin convinced Mišo to pile the entire storeroom into one heap, fixed the ventilation, had the black charred walls repainted and returned the place to a sensible hunters' menu, into which he wove a revived local sweet, Kremnica krumple. A month on the restaurant was clean and bright, the soup and roe-deer schnitzel excellent, and the only small slips were in the overbaked desserts. "I'm very proud of you today," Martin said. Rating: Martin gave 4 knives, Google 4.3/5.

Lucas Grill (Hriadky)

The season-three finale took Martin to the east, to the village of Hriadky, where Lucas Grill sits right on a main road. Owner Lukáš was head chef, waiter and handyman all in one, thirteen to fifteen hours a day, and parked a caravan by the restaurant so he could sleep in it. Martin called the à la carte menu catastrophic, all ready-made, accompanied from the kitchen by a "symphony of microwaves," and named the burger the single worst thing he tasted. The most important line of the evening also landed, that Lukáš and his health come first.

Martin got not just Lukáš's cooking brain moving but his life too, secretly sending him to his old teammates on the football pitch and slimming the menu to thirteen quality dishes including a sourdough sandwich with pulled grilled meat. A month on there was nowhere to park, the car park and the tables were full, and Lukáš had the roasted pork knee done tip-top. For what he achieved in a single month, and for starting to think about himself and his father's legacy, he took home 3 knives. Rating: Martin gave 3 knives, Google 4.3/5.

Martin versus the public

Season three was the first truly sharp one: Martin handed out two clean zeros (Pekidors and Penzión Janošík) and three four-knife transformations (Hostinec Raj, Veranda and Silvanus), and his average rating for the season is 2.67 knives. The public is gentler, giving the twelve venues an average of 4.16 out of 5 on Google, from 3.6 at Penzión Janošík to 4.5 at Hostinec Raj, VEG and Pekidors. The biggest story is precisely where Martin and the guests disagree most, for example Pekidors with a zero from Martin but 4.5 from the public. You can find the full numbers and the comparison of Martin's knives against the public's verdict across every season on the statistics page. And you can find every restaurant from the show on our interactive map.