Easily the best food of the trip so far. Georgian food blew my mind. I’m going to share just five dishes with you, but every single dish was deserving of a blog mention. The cuisine is very distinct, none of the foods were familiar to me from the balkans (only exception being lobio stew but it was quite different) or beyond, and nor were the flavours.
The famous
These two are warming and delicious and the perfect comfort food. Flavours are pretty unexciting, but yummy.
Khinkali
Georgia’s national dish so they deserve to be mentioned first. They’re pretty iconic. Dumplings filled with soup and meat and herbs. The meat can be swapped out for mushrooms, or potatoes, or cheese, or cheese and potatoes… You eat them by holding the knot and taking a little bite and then slurping the soup out of them, then eating the rest. If you succeed in not spilling a drop of soup it means you’re a good kisser. My all time favourite khinkali were the fried ones with blue cheese (dambalkhacho) from Cafe Daphna, Tbilisi.
Khachapuri
Georgia’s most ubiquitous dish - bread and cheese. Each region has its own variation and the most famous is the adjarian one (from Batumi in the west). It was also my favourite variation as it was slightly less bread heavy than the others! It’s definitely the most photographic with its boat shape and the egg in the middle. The rest are circles of bread with a cheese filling in between. My all time favourite khachapuri was the one the old lady (Dodo) made for me in Svaneti, but I didn’t actually eat that many of them!
The delicious
These two showcase the variety and depth of flavours in Georgian cooking.
Ostri
A soupy stew with beef and vegetables and potatoes. When placed in front of you it looks like an unassuming warming stew. But once you take your first spoonful, oh wow. This shows off what Georgian food is really all about, taking cosy Eastern European style food and injecting it with Asian flavours. It’s like eating a Tom Yum soup with its tang and umami flavour and spice, but more tomatoey and full. On a cold day it was perfect, warming you up in every sense.
Kharcho
This is comparable to a curry. A thick sauce over beef or chicken (I had chicken), made from ground up walnuts, tomato puree and spices. The flavours were full of depth and perfectly balanced. A little spicy, so tasty and almost creamy. This was my absolute favourite dish. I had it with Elarji which is a cheesy mash sort of dish, made from cornmeal and Georgian cheese.
The unassuming
I just have to mention this one again…
Svaneti salt on tomatoes
I’ve been thinking about it ever since Dodo served it to me in Svaneti. The flavours from the ‘salt’ blew me away then and they’ve held their own as I’ve enjoyed the rest of Georgia’s delicacies. The dish itself is so simple you can hardly call it a dish, but it’s so delicious I couldn’t write a Georgian food post without mentioning it!