Georgia

🇬🇪Adjara, Georgia

Achma

Აჩმა

An Adjarian layered khachapuri made by parboiling sheets of dough and layering them with salty sulguni cheese and butter, baked until golden.

🇬🇪Adjara, Georgia

Adjarian Cheese in Butter

Ბორანო

Young cheese melted in clarified butter until it separates into strings sitting in a pool of golden fat, eaten with bread.

🇬🇪Adjara, Georgia

Adjarian Khachapuri

Აჭარული ხაჭაპური

Bread dough shaped into an open boat, filled with brined cheese, and finished under the grill with a raw egg yolk and a slab of butter dropped in at the end.

🇬🇪Georgia

Adjika

Аджика

A pounded paste of hot red pepper, garlic, coriander seed, blue fenugreek and salt, made wet as a sauce or dry as a coarse rub.

🇬🇪Georgia

Ajapsandali

Აჯაფსანდალი

Aubergine, pepper, tomato, potato and onion stewed together with coriander and garlic, eaten hot or cold.

🇬🇪Samtskhe-Javakheti, Georgia

Apokhti

Აპოხტი

Apokhti is salted, air- or sun-dried meat; goose apokhti is the celebrated Meskhetian form used in a distinct rectangular khinkali.

🇬🇪Georgia

Aubergine Rolls with Walnut

Ბადრიჯანი ნიგვზით

Aubergine slices fried and rolled around a paste of ground walnut, garlic, coriander and vinegar, topped with pomegranate.

🇬🇪Georgia

Blue Fenugreek

Უცხო სუნელი

Ground blue fenugreek, the herb that gives Georgian food its characteristic warm, hay-like smell; not the same as Indian fenugreek.

🇬🇪Borjomi, Georgia

Borjomi Mineral Water

Ბორჯომი

A naturally carbonated, strongly saline mineral water from volcanic springs, bottled since 1890 and drunk as a digestive remedy.

🇦🇲Armenia

Bozbash

Bozbaş

Lamb on the bone boiled with chickpeas, chestnuts and sour plums into a clear, faintly sour broth served with the meat still in it.

🇬🇪Guria, Georgia

Brinjula

Ბრინჯულა

A Gurian cheese omelette with a thin dough base, similar to a khachapuri, combining eggs, cheese and a crisp pastry bottom.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Buglama

Buğlama

Azerbaijani Buğlama gently braises lamb or veal with onion, tomato, herbs, and little added liquid until tender.

🇬🇪Georgia

Caul-Wrapped Meatballs

Აფხაზურა

Spiced minced pork and beef patties wrapped in caul fat and fried or baked, then served with barberries and pomegranate.

🇬🇪Georgia

Chacha

Ჭაჭა

A clear grape pomace spirit distilled from what is left after pressing, usually strong, often homemade and drunk in small glasses at the table. Qvevri-aged chacha is a celebrated vessel-aged form of the same pomace spirit.

🇬🇪Adjara, Georgia

Chechili

Ჩეჩილი

A pickled cow's milk cheese from Adjara and Meskheti, stretched into threads and braided into a pigtail, with a tangy, chewy texture.

🇬🇪Georgia

Chicken and Egg Soup

Ჩიხირთმა

A chicken broth thickened with egg yolk and soured with vinegar or unripe grape juice, with coriander and no vegetables at all.

🇬🇪Racha-Lechkhumi and Kvemo Svaneti, Georgia

Chicken in Garlic and Milk

Შქმერული

Chicken flattened and fried hard in a clay pan, then finished in milk with an aggressive quantity of crushed garlic.

🇬🇪Georgia

Chicken in Tomato and Herbs

Ჩახოხბილი

Chicken browned dry, then stewed with a great weight of onion and tomato and finished with a fistful of coriander and basil.

🇬🇪Georgia

Chicken Tabaka

Წიწილა ტაბაკა

A whole young chicken flattened and pan-fried under a heavy weight in a traditional tapa pan, served with garlic sauce or tkemali.

🇹🇷Turkey

Churchkhela

Ჩურჩხელა

Walnuts or hazelnuts threaded on a string and dipped repeatedly in thickened grape must until they build a firm candle-shaped coating.

🇬🇪Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti, Georgia

Chvishtari

Ჩვიშტარი

Cornmeal dough kneaded through with sulguni cheese and fried in a pan so the cheese melts into the crumb and crisps at the crust.

🇬🇪Georgia

Coriander Sauce

Კინძმარი

A thin sauce of vinegar, water, crushed garlic and a great deal of chopped coriander, poured over grilled meat and fish.

🇬🇪Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti, Georgia

Cornmeal with Sulguni

Ელარჯი

Coarse cornmeal cooked to a stiff porridge and beaten with a great deal of sulguni until the whole mass strings like melted cheese.

🇬🇪Georgia

Curd Cheese with Mint

Ნადუღი

Fresh whey curd mixed with mint and wrapped in a sheet of sulguni, sliced into rolls and served cold.

🇬🇪Mtskheta-Mtianeti, Georgia

Dambalkhacho

Დამბალხაჭო

A rare, moldy aged curd cheese from the mountain regions of Tianeti and Pshavi, dried and aged in qvevri for 1-2 months, with an intense, spicy flavour.

🇧🇦Bosnia and Herzegovina

Dolma

دلمه

Vegetables such as peppers, eggplants, tomatoes, or zucchini hollowed out and stuffed with a mixture of rice, pine nuts, currants, and sometimes ground meat. The olive-oil vegetarian version (zeytinyağlı dolma) is served cold and is a staple of the Turkish meze table.

🇬🇪Georgia

Dzykka

Dzykka is a thick Ossetian-style Georgian porridge of flour and dairy, served warm as a plain, sustaining bowl.

🇬🇪Imereti, Georgia

Ekala

Ეკალა

A Georgian pkhali made from smilax (greenbrier) shoots, chopped and bound with walnut paste, garlic and herbs, shaped into patties.

🇬🇪Georgia

Family Pork and Potatoes

Ოჯახური

Pork and potato fried together in a clay pan with onion until both are browned at the edges, served in the pan it was cooked in.

🇬🇪Georgia

Fruit Leather

Ტყლაპი

Sheets of puréed plum, apricot or sour cherry dried in the sun until leathery, eaten as a sweet or soaked to sour a stew.

🇬🇪Imereti, Georgia

Gadazelili Cheese

Გადაზელილი ყველი

Gadazelili Cheese is Imeretian cheese kneaded and re-melted in warm milk until it becomes a supple, layered cheese with a clean dairy flavour.

🇬🇪Georgia

Georgian Baked Eggs

Ჩირბული

Eggs cooked into a base of tomato, walnut, onion and coriander until just set, served in the pan for breakfast.

🇬🇪Georgia

Georgian Bean Stew

Ლობიო

Red kidney beans stewed with onion, coriander, blue fenugreek and walnut, served in a clay pot with corn bread and pickles.

🇬🇪Guria, Georgia

Georgian Black Tea

Ქართული ჩაი

Black tea grown on the humid western slopes, once produced at enormous scale for the Soviet market and now revived by small growers.

🇬🇪Georgia

Georgian Kebab in Lavash

Ქაბაბი

Spiced minced lamb and beef moulded onto a flat skewer, grilled over coals and wrapped in thin bread with onion and sumac.

🇬🇪Georgia

Georgian Lemonade

Ლიმონათი

Sweet carbonated fruit sodas in pear, cream, grape and feijoa flavours, sold in glass bottles and drunk with meals.