Khachapuri from Turkuaz Kitchen
You probably know I make Khachapuri a lot—it’s a classic dish from Georgian (the country) cuisine. My grandparents lived in Georgia and visiting them in the summer was always my favorite time. Georgian food is one of our favorites—so flavorful and full of character.
Now my kids are cooking all kinds of Georgian dishes too. Last summer I finally bought one of my favorite cookbooks, Turkuaz Kitchen—actually I have two copies (plus one my som got too), so I can use one here in Mexico and another in Minnesota. The author has tons of great recipes, beautiful photos and the very first one is khachapuri.
I’ve already made naan and a few other dishes from this book, all easy and delicious. Yesterday I tried her version of khachapuri. It felt different—the dough was more like a bread dough, but little bit too much and puffed —and she uses four cheeses: mozzarella, feta, Parmesan, and blue cheese. (Traditional khachapuri is made with a special cheese called suluguni.)
I usually use panela and a bit of mozzarella or feta if I don’t have suluguni on hand. It was interesting to try her take, and I’ll probably make it again, though I’d skip the blue cheese—it was a bit too sharp. In the end, we still prefer my recipe, probably because it’s closer to the real khachapuri I remember from my trips to Georgia, and from some restaurants when I lived in Odessa. But I totally agree with her, when you are cooking, do dishes and use ingredients to your taste.
