He says it all began with an identity crisis. “I followed my brother and my friend’s recommendation to enrol in Maribor’s Vocational College for Catering and Tourism. I was very lucky to have had extremely good teachers for cooking and serving, who presented the occupation in a very interesting manner. I was as a student also able to do a half-year internship in Ireland, which piqued my curiosity about this vocation even more,” Jorg said about his beginnings. After returning to Slovenia, he first got a place with the famous TV chef Bine Volčič. “Bine and I have been nurturing a friendly relationship from the very beginning and I think that it was him who greatly eased my entry into cooking. He presented haute cuisine in an extremely interesting manner and filled me with the desire to continue my career abroad,” adds the 28-year old master chef, whose postings include a prestigious French restaurant in London and monthly traineeships in Australia, England and Norway. In Slovenia he has learnt from the very best as well. “My cooking career has been mainly influenced by chef Igor Jagodic, because I worked with him for longer than with anyone else. It is obvious that he has a lot of experience, because he’s a very relaxed person,” Jorg told us. But he also learned abroad and he brought back something new from his every working stint. “One always brings something back from abroad. Especially in the sense of new work processes, management ideas etc. I naturally transfer all of those to my team at the Atelje. But I’m not only transferring knowledge, I also urge them to go for internships abroad themselves. A girl from my team is learning new things as we speak at the Fat Duck, a Michelin three-star restaurant in London, and she had also worked in Hiša Franko, while a boy from the team has also trained abroad,” explained Jorg, who is the master chef in the renovated and renowned Smrekarjev Hram restaurant, whose past and links between cooking and art have also resulted in its new name, the Atelje. “We want to simplify things, the plates…We removed table cloths, we took off our gloves and bowties. I want to bring haute cuisine closer to people through a more relaxed atmosphere. We simplified the food, but only at a first glance, which I believe allows people to indulge even more in the pleasure of eating,” added Jorg, who places a lot of stress on traditional techniques and skills, like home-made vinegar, bread, yoghurt and kefir. “We make them in the kitchen in the way our grandmothers did,” concluded Jorg who is set to continue a tradition of culinary delights in the Atelje on Nazorjeva Street.