stay húngry

Nothing has ever come easy for the former Soviet republic of Georgia, but it is still a place of fascinating cuisine, centuries-old bathhouses, and steadfast good humor. On a visit to Tbilisi and the nearby mountains of the Caucasus, Gary Shteyngart learns that resistance comes in many flavors

- 

every child who grew up in the northern wastes of the Soviet Union, as I did, remembers an early encounter with a local Georgian restaurant: the surprising combinations of walnut and garlic in chicken satsivi; the kick of cherry plum in kharcho, a beef soup that made Leningrad’s cold cabbage concoctions seem like a bad dream. In a world of heavy, buttery food and even heavier ideology, a trip to a Georgian restaurant could offer a Russian child a taste of life and community and tradition (and for the adults, some decent wine). When I was about six, my family took a flight—my first—to Sukhumi, part of Abkhazia, which since 2008 has been occupied by pro-Russian forces. The palm trees, the temperate but sticky heat, the roadside cheese pies and candies, the smiles on the faces of old ladies...if anything led me to become a traveler, it was that visit.

Today the signs at the airport proclaim, “Tbilisi, the city that loves you.” And visitors seem to love it right back. The capital of Georgia, and the unofficial capital of the Caucasus region, Tbilisi has become a tourist magnet and a club destination for European youth. Georgia is one of the great ancient wine centers of the world and the contemporary scene has been growing in recent years. But even more than wine, Georgian food has become one of the country’s great cultural exports. The cuisine offers a truly distinct blend of unexpected flavors (where else does the walnut play such an important role?) while also being visually arresting, with frigate-size cheese boats and soup dumplings as big as your head.