Georgian Cuisine: A Complete Guide to Dishes, Wines and Flavours of the Caucasus

Georgian Cuisine: A Feast for the Senses

The Georgian table is, above all, a pleasure for the eyes. Georgian cuisine, presented with real artistry, offers a multitude of dishes — each more tempting than the last — accompanied by bottles of Georgian wine: an irresistible invitation to the pleasures of the palate.

Guests will be surprised to find that their plate is always full, thanks to the attentive care of fellow diners and the generous hospitality of the hosts. It is worth noting that dishes are not served individually but in a multitude of shared platters piled high on the table.

Georgian honour demands that there is always something to eat on the table, so don't try to finish everything out of politeness. Another quirk: Georgians don't say "bon appétit". Since drinking is highly ritualised and forms the centrepiece of the meal, eating begins informally — and with a certain urgency, the perfect excuse to fill up quickly before the toasts begin. A tip: set a good pace during the meal; eat well between each glass, especially salty things, to help absorb the alcohol. That's the Georgian technique.

Ways of Eating in Georgia

International fast food has made its presence felt in the main cities. In Tbilisi there are already more than 25 McDonald's, plus other fast-food restaurants serving both Georgian and European food. Nevertheless, Georgians still prefer the warmth of traditional restaurants. Khachapuri bought from a street bakery is, in essence, the quintessential form of traditional fast food.

Many restaurants take their time to serve you, so patience is a virtue — don't be in a rush. Don't be surprised if the chips don't arrive at the same time as the skewers or the khachapuri, or if your plate is changed every few minutes: that's the local standard of good service.

As a rough guide, a local beer costs between 5 and 8 lari; an imported one, between 8 and 12. A portion of khachapuri ranges from 3–4 lari at a bakery to 10–15 lari in a restaurant [VERIFY].

Dishes and Products of Georgian Cuisine

Adjapsandali – a highly spiced vegetable stew.

Apkhazouri – spiced meat filling (often pork or lamb).

Asetrina – sturgeon.

Badrijani nigvzit (salati) – aubergine salad with a crushed walnut sauce, often garnished with pomegranate seeds.

Kababi – the Georgian kebab, filled with minced meat (usually pork, though also lamb or beef), onion, and egg. It is sausage-shaped and sometimes wrapped in lavash flatbread.

Kaourma – roasted chicken liver with onions and sautéed potatoes.

Kefali – grilled fish, a speciality of the Black Sea coast.

Khashi – a hangover cure soup made from tripe and garlic. Many Westerners find it hard to try!

Kharcho – a soup often used as a remedy the morning after a supra with too much wine; it is a richly spiced beef and rice broth.

Khachapuri – Georgia's signature dish: a type of bread filled or topped with cheese, eggs, and salt, all melted and served piping hot. The main varieties are: imeruli (the simple version); megruli (brushed with egg before baking for a golden crust); guruli (crescent-shaped with a hard-boiled egg inside); atchma (layered, like a millefeuille); and phenovani (diamond-shaped, dry, and easy to eat on the go). The most popular variety is the adjaruli: an open boat-shaped bread in which an egg is cracked and baked in the centre. Butter is added, the egg is stirred in, and you eat it by tearing off pieces of bread from the edges.

Khinkali – the famous Georgian dumplings. Made from a dough of mixed-grain flour, rolled out thin and cut into circles with a glass, then filled. The filling can be pepper, fresh herbs, onions, and minced lamb or pork (kalakuri); plain minced meat in the mountain version (mojasco or khevsuruli); mashed potato with butter (kartophilit); or mushrooms (sokot'i).

Kuchmachi – thinly sliced pork offal with saffron, onions, coriander, garlic, and salt, with a dash of vinegar. Served cold, garnished with pomegranate seeds.

Kupati – pork sausage with pepper and onion.

Khveli (cheese). Georgian cheese ranges in style from feta to mozzarella. It is often eaten as a starter or with salads, and even between toasts to buffer the effects of the wine (it is quite salty). Most cheeses are made from cow's milk, though sheep's and goat's milk varieties also exist. The best-known varieties are: sulguni, a cow's milk cheese (sometimes sheep's or goat's) of Mingrelian origin, elastic and similar to mozzarella; suluguni chebolili, its smoked version; gouda (pure coincidence with the Dutch cheese), a mountain sheep's milk cheese similar to feta; and imeruli, the Imeretian cheese, almost always made from cow's milk and also similar to feta.

Lavash – traditional Georgian bread, baked in a tone (bread oven). To bake it, the dough is pressed against the inside of the oven; lavash typically has a double layer of dough, rounded in the centre and tapering to a point at each end. Georgian bread is quite salty.

Lobiani – pressed red beans and pepper, shaped similarly to khachapuri.

Lobio – red bean stew with coriander, garlic, and walnuts. A speciality of Mtskheta, usually eaten alongside mtchadi.

Arayani – yoghurt, often served at breakfast.

Mtchadi – cornbread, typical of western Georgia.

Mtsvadi – meat skewers, often pork, sometimes beef or lamb. The Kakhetians are the masters. Eaten with onions and sometimes finished with pomegranate juice or red wine poured over the grill.

Nazuki – a cinnamon and raisin brioche, a speciality of Surami (available to buy on the Tbilisi–Kutaisi road).

Odjakhuri – roasted pork with potatoes and mushrooms, served very hot in a ketsi (clay dish). Sometimes topped with cheese.

Ostri – beef broth with tomatoes, potatoes, and rice, heavily seasoned with pepper.

Pomidoris da kitris salati – tomato and cucumber salad, very popular in Georgia to start a meal. It is quite salty and often used to counteract the effects of alcohol. It is usually accompanied by parsley, onion, salt, sweet or hot peppers, and can be quite spicy.

Satsivi – turkey, guinea fowl, or chicken in a walnut sauce, one of the Georgians' favourite dishes. The poultry stock is seasoned with saffron, vinegar, onion, and walnuts; it is then served cold (tsivi means "cold" in Georgian).

Sliavi – veal with fresh herbs and dried plums.

Tabaka – whole roasted chicken cut into portions (breast, wings, thighs), served with tkemali or tomato sauce.

Tchanakhi – oven-baked lamb served with aubergines, potatoes, fresh tomatoes, and herbs.

Chvishdari – the Imeretian version of mtchadi with cheese; a cornbread and cheese cake that, while nutritious in itself, is designed to accompany other dishes.

Tchakaphuli – pan-fried lamb in white wine with onion, plums, and tkemali sauce.

Tchikhirtma – chicken, onion, and coriander soup.

Churchkhela – a traditional Georgian sweet. Walnuts or hazelnuts are threaded on a string and repeatedly dipped in thick grape syrup. Found in markets and roadside stalls across the country; in shape it resembles a sausage.

Tolma – vine leaves stuffed with minced lamb and rice. Within the Caucasus it is an Armenian speciality (dolma), but it is widely enjoyed in Georgia.

Tskhotskali – river fish, boiled and served cold.

Georgian Sauces

Adjika – a rich and aromatic red pepper sauce.

Bajé – a sauce of walnuts, walnut oil, onions, garlic, coriander, red peppers, and salt. Brought to the boil and served to accompany salads or main dishes such as chicken.

Tkemali – a sauce made from crushed seasonal fruits (often mirabelle plum), salted with coriander. Tkemali accompanies many dishes of Georgian cuisine.

Tomatis satsebela – a spicy tomato sauce of Mingrelian origin, made with chillies, garlic, tomatoes, and coriander.

Fruits of Georgia

The age of deep-freezing has not yet fully arrived in Georgia, and fruit remains seasonal, as it once was everywhere. Depending on the time of year, you'll have the chance to try different produce. Among the most common fruits you'll find apples, pears, plums, apricots, peaches, pomegranates, watermelons, guavas, mulberries, wild blackberries, kiwis, persimmons, lemons, oranges, mandarins, quinces, figs, and of course grapes. Forest berries are less common, though the banana has also become a regular fixture.

Drinks of Georgia

White wine (mtsvane, rkatsiteli, tsitska grapes), red (saperavi, alexandruli, mujuretuli), rosé… Among the best whites: Tsinandali, Mtsvani, Alazani, Alaznis Veli (Kakheti). Among the reds: Saperavi, Napareuli, Mukuzani, Kindzmarauli, Akhacheni, Alazani, Pirosmani (Kakheti) and Khvantchkara (Racha).

For beer (ludi), the main brands are Kazbegi, Natakhtari, Argo and Zedazeni.

Chacha – grape brandy, Georgia's national spirit.

Gomi – a Georgian vodka brand.

Soft drinks – always fruit-flavoured (peach, lemon…); the main brands are Kazbegi, Natakhtari, Zedazeni and Zandukeli.

The main mineral water brands are Borjomi, Nabeghlavi, Likani and Sairme.

Georgian Wine: 8,000 Years of Tradition

By Benoît Fil, GWS (Georgian Wine Society). Historically, around five hundred grape varieties have been recorded in Georgia, the majority indigenous. These vines express themselves in very different ways depending on the territory in which they are cultivated. Although less regulated than in Spain or France, a concept of "designation of origin" has developed over time, based on the pairing of grape variety and terroir.

In the Kakheti region, the quintessential wine-growing area, we find the black saperavi grape, which produces high-quality wines, especially in the designation zones of Mukuzani (Gurjaani area; dry wine), Napareuli (Telavi area; dry wine) and Kindzmarauli (Kvareli area; semi-dry wine).

For white wines we find mainly rkatsiteli and mtsvane, which are used to produce the designation wines Tsinandali (Telavi area; dry wine) and Vazisubani (Gurjaani area; dry wine). Mtsvane, more aromatic and complex than rkatsiteli, also produces an excellent single-variety wine.

These white varieties are the ones most traditionally grown in this part of Georgia, and they allow every family to produce kakhuri wine, the result of fermenting whole grapes in buried clay vessels called qvevri, whose capacity ranges from a few dozen to several thousand litres.

This maceration-fermentation process lasts several weeks and gives kakhuri wine a very tannic, oxidised character (amber-brown colour). Although somewhat unusual for Western palates, this wine — generally low in alcohol — is greatly cherished by Georgians, who will not hesitate to offer it to you if you pass through their home.

Further towards the centre of Georgia, in the Khashuri region, we find the tsitska grape, which serves as the base for quality sparkling wines, as well as the black pinot noir. Moving a little further west, we arrive at the mountainous region of Racha (capital Ambrolauri), whose vineyards are notable for their steep slopes. There the alexandruli and mujuretuli varieties are grown, producing the celebrated semi-dry red wine with the designation of origin Khvantchkara.

Finally, venturing deeper into the Caucasus, we reach the Lechkhumi region (capital Tsageri), where the odjalechi grape variety is grown, producing a wine of the same name. And who knows — you may have the chance to taste in this region Georgia's rarest wine, Usakhelauri, whose enigmatic name means "the one without a name"…

Article based on the book Petit Futé – Georgia.

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