In Georgia bread — "puri" — is more than a side. No feast starts without it; it is torn by hand, dipped in sauces and wrapped around cheese and herbs. And it is baked in a special way: in round clay ovens sunk into the ground. The smell of fresh bread from such a bakery is one of the first impressions of Tbilisi.
Shoti — bread from the tone
Shoti, also called dedas puri ("mother's bread"), is the most common Georgian bread. It is baked in a tone, a deep round oven of clay or brick heated with wood. The baker slaps the dough onto the hot inner wall and a few minutes later fishes it out with a long hook.
Shoti is shaped like a long canoe with pointed ends. The crust is crisp, the crumb airy and slightly moist. It is best eaten hot, straight from the oven, on the walk home.
Where to buy: almost every Tbilisi neighbourhood has a small tone bakery, often in a half-basement with a window at pavement level. Look for a queue of locals in the morning and evening. A loaf costs about 1–1.5 lari.
Mrgvali — round bread
Mrgvali puri is a round flat bread from the same tone, sometimes with a pattern in the centre. It is denser than shoti and stays fresh longer.
Village bread
In Kakheti and villages people bake big round village bread in tone ovens in their yards, sometimes with finger marks on top. If you stay in a guesthouse, your host will almost certainly bake some for dinner.
Lavash
Thin lavash is also baked in the tone and used to wrap mtsvadi, cheese and herbs, especially in Kakheti and the south.
Mchadi — cornbread
Mchadi are dense cakes of cornmeal, water and salt. In western Georgia corn replaced wheat for centuries, so mchadi is everyday bread there. It is baked in a pan or on clay ketsi and served with lobio, cheese, herbs and spicy Megrelian dishes. Simple, slightly sweet, with a crisp crust.
Don't confuse mchadi with ghomi — not bread but cornmeal porridge, eaten instead of bread in Samegrelo.
Lobiani — bean bread
Lobiani is a round flatbread filled with spiced mashed beans. It looks like Imeruli khachapuri but has beans instead of cheese — a filling, cheap food for breakfast and fasting days. The best-known version is Rachan lobiani with pieces of smoked ham.
Khachapuri is bread too
Strictly speaking khachapuri is "bread with cheese", and Georgians see it as part of the bread tradition. Penovani, Imeruli, Megruli and Adjaruli each belong to a different region.
Nazuki — sweet bread
Nazuki is a sweet bread with cinnamon, raisins and spices from the town of Surami. Dozens of nazuki stalls line the Tbilisi–Kutaisi highway near Surami, and stopping for hot sweet bread has become a tradition.
Easter bread
At Easter Georgians bake paska, a sweet enriched bread with raisins, and dye eggs red. Bakeries are packed during the holidays.
Bread traditions
- Bread is torn by hand. Cutting shoti with a knife at the table isn't the custom.
- Bread isn't thrown away. Old bread goes to animals or is dried.
- A tone in every yard. Many village families have their own tone oven.
- Fresh bread every day. Georgians buy bread almost daily, so bakeries work from early morning till evening.
Try baking it yourself
Some bakeries and guesthouses let you bake bread in a tone. It is harder than it looks: you have to slap the dough onto the scorching wall quickly without burning yourself. Great fun for families.
What to eat with bread
- fresh sulguni or Imeretian cheese;
- herbs — coriander, tarragon, basil;
- tomatoes and cucumbers;
- tkemali or adjika;
- matsoni with honey for breakfast.
A simple breakfast of hot shoti, cheese, tomatoes and herbs is one of the tastiest in Georgia and costs next to nothing.
In short
Pop into a basement tone bakery in Tbilisi and buy a hot shoti — a must. Try mchadi with lobio, Rachan lobiani and nazuki on the road to Kutaisi. And if you are invited into a village home, watch your host bake bread in the tone in the yard.
