A guide to Na nože season 5: every restaurant and its story

Season 5 of Na nože (2025): from Skýcov to Brezno

Season 5 of Na nože is the biggest one yet: Martin Novák rescued ten restaurants, from Skýcov near Zlaté Moravce all the way to Brezno under the Low Tatras, and even crossed the border into Valašské Klobouky in the Czech Republic. This time every episode ends with a concrete knife rating, so for the first time we can directly compare Martin's verdict with what the public says about each place on Google. The range is huge: from two knives for restaurants that are only at the starting line, up to five knives for two stories that went „from zero to a hundred". Here is the whole fifth season, restaurant by restaurant, including what really happened behind the kitchen doors. Every place from this season is open today, so these are spots genuinely worth visiting.

Bonanza ranč (Skýcov)

Season 5 opened in converted stables out in the countryside, home to Bonanza ranč. The problem was a huge, fragmented menu (a „Bermuda triangle" between Japanese, Slovak and Italian cooking) and chef Mišo, who cooked without spark and bent everything to the owner's wishes. The first visit brought falling-apart „Slovak sushi", stroganoff with no mushrooms, an overcooked salmon and risotto made from plain side-dish rice. Guests waited up to two and a half hours for their food and left saying they would not come back.

Martin laid it out plainly: the head chef is master of the kitchen, not the manager or the owner. He taught Mišo a proper risotto technique and gave him his full trust in front of the whole team. The menu was trimmed and given a western, cowboy theme that finally fit the ranch: pulled beef with cornbread, picadillo, cheese-and-chili pierogi. Returning after a month, Martin found a completely different restaurant with seasonal game and a Mišo who had started inventing his own dishes. Martin gave Bonanza ranč 4 knives, while the public rates it 4.3 out of 5 on Google.

Mavi's (Pezinok)

In Pezinok, inside a sports hall right next to the swimming pool, sits Mavi's, run by married couple Marek and Ivana. It stood empty at lunchtime, and Martin was greeted before he even parked by an overflowing bin and a mess. The menu was full of typos, the cutlery had dried-on residue, and the food was a disaster: rubbery cold bread, a stock with no aroma, overcooked noodles in a „creamy blob" and, the crowning moment, mould on the parmesan. The core problem was not the food, though, but the people: nobody cared, Ivana was too soft and Marek had given up.

Martin pushed them to start the change with themselves, warmed up the sterile „swimming-pool" interior and introduced a seasonal autumn menu (buttered toasts with pulled ham hock, spinach cream with a poached egg, pappardelle with beetroot puree). On the gala night the kitchen collapsed, dishes went out cold and some guests left, but a month later the restaurant was tidier and calmer. The experienced chef Peter, who had cracked on the gala night due to personal problems, stayed and began working on himself. In the end the owners symbolically handed him the rating. Mavi's got 2 knives from Martin, reflecting that the place is more at the starting line than at the finish. The public gives it 4.0 out of 5 on Google.

Bistro Zetko (Vieska nad Žitavou)

Right next to the Mlyňany Arboretum stands Bistro Zetko, held together by completely exhausted co-owner Katka while her husband does business in Cyprus. Online reviews spoke of slow, inattentive service, but what horrified Martin most were the owner's insulting, aggressive replies to those reviews. Martin played James Bond: he sent a colleague onto the terrace wearing camera glasses and watched from the broadcast van as the waitresses ignored him for over ten minutes. When he later sat down himself, the service was suddenly fast and smiling, a classic double standard for customers.

Tasting the food, he found it was not the main problem (the burger was actually really good); the staff and those insulting replies were. He made owner Marek read out his own comments and supported the shaken Katka. He added a QR-code menu, a screen showing fresh reviews and a new seasonal menu (fig carpaccio with burrata, duck confit with cassoulet, mussels in wine). The test dinner was a big success, a full restaurant served in an hour and 20 minutes. Returning after a month, Martin was a fully satisfied guest and rated Bistro Zetko 4 knives. The public gives it 4.2 out of 5 on Google.

Smokehouse (Košice)

In the centre of Košice sits Smokehouse, an American BBQ-style restaurant whose identity is smoke and fire from its own smoker. Owner and head chef Rasto learned smoking in the USA and Denmark, but ran the place more or less „in the evenings" alongside another job. The reviews were clear: tasty food, but a brutally long wait, up to 45 minutes. On the first visit Martin got his starter only after 28 minutes, the ribs were dry and tough, and the burger was overcooked and drowned in mayonnaise that killed even the house pastrami. Plenty of good ideas, poor execution.

The core problem was a missing system: the kitchen was run by young, mostly untrained girls working alongside school, with no leadership. The only one who clearly cared was waitress Matilda, who volunteered to clean herself. Martin trimmed the menu to a clear identity (a Ruben Sandwich with house pastrami, a 6-hour beef rib, a three-meat combo), introduced checklists and taught the team to communicate. Returning after a month, they handled a full Friday with peak-time waits of no more than 10 minutes, and the team even invented its own pulled-meat croquettes. Martin gave Smokehouse 4 knives and handed the rating to Matilda. The public rates it 4.3 out of 5 on Google.

Restaurace Anděl (Valašské Klobouky)

The season's only foreign stop took Martin to Valašské Klobouky in the Czech Republic, just over the border, to Restaurace Anděl, which combines a restaurant, a café and a children's play corner. Owner Sixtin did practically everything while heavily pregnant and barely seeing her daughter. Here the issue was neither the people nor the food (which was decent and cheap, a Caesar salad for a ridiculous 6.60 euro), but the economics: prices were too low, and the children's „Lumpárnička" downstairs was a „ball and chain" that drained the staff's energy.

Martin merged the downstairs with the upstairs into a single restaurant to turn more tables, and steered the place towards an Italian style with its own homemade pasta. This is also where the rebrand to Angel Pizza Pasta was born. The test dinner was packed and people could not praise the homemade pasta enough. A month later the place was alive, but the team had drifted a little from the lean concept: they added pricier steaks and panko breadcrumbs that do not belong in Italian cooking. Martin therefore rated Restaurace Anděl, now operating as Angel Pizza Pasta, 3 knives for a real but still wobbly improvement. The public gives it 4.4 out of 5 on Google.

Sandorf (Prievaly)

In the Záhorie village of Prievaly stands the Sandorf complex with its own brewery, guesthouse and wellness. The guesthouse and wellness were profitable, but the restaurant beside them was buckling. It was run by two women, 25-year-old Izabela and her stepmother Ľubka, whose responsibilities overlapped, while chef Peťo disagreed with the menu dictated to him. The first visit brought a lukewarm soup, rubbery duck skin, tagliatelle without a gram of salt and a cold burger. These were exactly the complaints Martin's mystery diners had reported to him earlier.

Martin stood up for chef Peťo: if his menu contains dishes he disagrees with, the problem is not in the kitchen but in the leadership, with two bosses contradicting each other. Together with Peťo he cooked up a beer-themed menu (beer soup, braised beef brisket, pancakes with beer jam). Returning after a month, the restaurant was repainted and the food was a clear step up (excellent game with dill sauce, fried beer cheese), but floor management and dining-room details were still not under control. Martin symbolically handed the sticker to Peťo and rated Sandorf 3 knives. The public gives it 4.1 out of 5 on Google.

Oravský Zrub (Nižná, Orava)

In the Orava village of Nižná, beside a main road used by nearly a million cars a day, stands the wooden Oravský Zrub run by two friends, Tomáš and Ľubo. After two and a half years of struggle they were losing around 400 to 500 euro a day and on the brink of closing. But the first visit brought a surprise: the food was excellent. The garlic soup smelled wonderful, the svíčková was „at least as good as mine" and the dumpling was „like cotton wool". „I haven't had svíčková this good even in Prague, so where is your problem?", Martin asked.

The problem was not the kitchen but the marketing, and the fact that the place could not divert even a small percentage of those million cars passing by. So Martin did not change the food, he changed the direction: bring lunches to the customer, to a nearby industrial park with a thousand employees. He launched a delivery service of proper lunches, added loyalty cards, and a month later the cabin was working differently, delivering daily menus and already serving three companies. „You have the best restaurant in the area, you just have to convince the customers too," Martin summed up, and gave Oravský Zrub a full 5 knives. The public rates it 4.4 out of 5 on Google.

Pizza Família (Slovenské Kľačany)

In a village of barely 170 inhabitants in the middle of a „hunger valley" stands Pizza Família, the fulfilled dream of owner Kristýna, a former nurse. At the entrance Martin was greeted by a freezer that also held schnitzels, fries and convenience products. The first visit brought a watery soup, a pizza with a soggy centre, meat as tough „as a hockey puck" that smelled of microwave plastic, and cold cheese spaghetti. The only bright spot was honest tripe soup. The biggest problem, though, was not the food but the silence: the team was not united, one shift working against the other.

Martin asked the team to cook him their best dishes, and at last there was laughter in the kitchen. He threw out the convenience products and the old „toy" cooker, brought in new equipment and built the concept around celebrations and party catering (pork tenderloin Wellington-style, trout with spinach). The gala night did not go well, the team stalled, and a month later the convenience products had gone but old mistakes lingered (underbaked lasagne, a curdled chocolate mousse). Martin therefore gave Pizza Família 2 knives. The owner's heart is in the right place and honest basics have returned, but the fractured team and unresolved tension keep the place low. The public gives it 4.2 out of 5 on Google.

Piváreň u Kultána (Radoľa)

In the Kysuce village of Radoľa stands Piváreň u Kultána, which lived for decades on good beer and bears the name of its late founder. The kitchen was added only recently and the family took on debt for it. The first visit was a disaster: a tough, under-aged „utopenec", a tasteless „coleslaw" („If that's coleslaw, I'm Miroslav"), rubbery fries and a dried-out schnitzel. Yet the back-of-house impressed Martin („you have facilities I've never seen on this show"), even though the kitchen had „no system, no head", because the owners stood over the chefs' shoulders and the cooks kept leaving.

Martin also uncovered the painful reason for cook Kika's block: her brother had died in an accident the year before. For the gala night he brought in his former Na nože alumnus Janko as head chef and built a simple, honest menu starring a classic creamy svíčková. Returning after a month, owner Renáta was a different person, no longer running the kitchen; they had found a new head chef, Patrik, and Kika had blossomed. The turnaround was, in Martin's words, „from zero to a hundred", and Piváreň u Kultána earned a full 5 knives, the season's top score alongside Oravský Zrub. The public gives it 4.4 out of 5 on Google.

Red Horse (Brezno)

The final episode took Martin to Brezno, into a former ironworks where Red Horse sits inside a sports-car museum. The museum was thriving, but the kitchen ran entirely on convenience products, everything frozen and industrially prepared. On the first visit Martin sent back a venison svíčková that stank, and said the meat medley tasted „as if you'd licked a washing machine's backside". Even the sole chef, Juraj, admitted: „I've cooked for 25 years and this is the first place where I cook from convenience products."

Martin named the root of the problem directly: owner Marcel spent money on overpriced frozen products instead of the kitchen and the people, and he accepted it all without excuses. Martin brought in a blast chiller, sous-vide and a vacuum sealer, taught the team to make „real" beef cheeks and launched a search for new floor staff. A month later the problem service had been replaced, convenience products were cut by nearly 90 percent and the cheeks were „food porn". Not everything was perfect (a lumpy parsnip cream, raw-looking meat on the skewer), but the place made a real step. Martin gave Red Horse 3 knives for tangible progress. This is where Martin and the public diverge most: on Google the place has only 3.6 out of 5, the lowest score of the whole season.

Martin versus the public

Season 5 lets us directly compare Martin's knives with the public's verdict for the first time. He handed out everything from 2 knives (Mavi's, Pizza Família) through 3 and 4 up to two fives, for Oravský Zrub and Piváreň u Kultána, two stories that went „from zero to a hundred". The public is generally more generous: the Google ratings of the ten restaurants range from 3.6 at Red Horse to 4.4 at the top three. The most interesting places are exactly the ones where the two views diverge. You will find the complete numbers and the comparison of Martin's knives against the public's ratings across every season on the statistics page. And you can discover every restaurant from the show on our interactive map.