Ajapsandal for Eastern peoples is like dumplings for Russians, borscht for Ukrainians, pasta for Italians, onion soup for the French, or pudding for the British. Perhaps the comparison is not entirely successful, but the essence is not difficult to grasp. Although the set of ingredients from which ajapsandal is prepared is practically the same everywhere, every Georgian, Abkhazian, Azerbaijani or Armenian woman adds something of her own to the juicy vegetable caviar. Therefore, the dish turns out with a twist, peppercorn, a cherry on the cake ... In general, call it what you want. The meaning will remain the same. For example, I prepare this dish as described in the photo recipe below. And although I do not have the slightest, even the most distant relation to the peoples of the East, I offer my own interpretation of the famous snack. Because it turns out to be really tasty. So much so that you want to eat straight with a spoon.

Ajapsandal is made from the following ingredients:

How we will cook ajapsandal (step by step recipe with photo):

Let's start cooking summer fragrant ajapsandal? Wash vegetables thoroughly. Soak up moisture. Wrap eggplants, bell peppers, squash and tomatoes with aluminum foil, shiny side out. Preheat the oven to 180-200 degrees. Transfer prepared vegetables to a wire rack or baking sheet. Take out baked ingredients as you cook. Large tomatoes will be ready in 10-15 minutes. The pepper will be ready in 5 minutes. Check immediately if the eggplants are baked by wearing an oven mitt. They should be soft to the touch. The zucchini is cooked the longest. In the oven, he should spend about 20-25 minutes. On a note. Cooking in the oven can be replaced by roasting over a fire. Smoky snack tastes even better.
Cool the baked vegetables. Peel off the foil carefully. Clean up. It's easy to do even with your hands, the skin practically disappears by itself.
Are the vegetables comfortable to touch? Start slicing. I used to make ajapsandal from vegetables cut into small cubes. This is what this photo recipe demonstrates. But no one will be offended if you cut into cubes. The first is pepper. Because it cooled down the fastest. But you can change the cutting sequence.
Eggplant. It is advisable to use young "blue" ones so as not to taste bitter. And large grains in the dish do not look very appetizing.
Tomatoes. But baked tomatoes cannot be cut into cubes. The soft pulp "spreads" even under a sharp knife. Well, okay. This will be a light tomato dressing, with which the ajapsandal will be even juicier and tastier.
From the baked zucchini remained. The skin does not come off as easily from it as from other vegetables. We'll have to work with a knife. Also cut the squash pulp into cubes. If there are large seeds, discard them.
Now the spices. Take 3-4 medium garlic cloves. Peel and finely chop.
Cilantro and basil. This aromatic splendor can be substituted with parsley. Or use only cilantro. Wash the selected greens. Dry. Chop finely.
Then the highlight. Rather, a peppercorn. Don't like spicy foods? Will the children also eat the dish? Do not add hot peppers. I have it in my photo recipe. Decided to add? Cut off the desired amount from the pod. Take out the seeds. Chop finely, finely. Thoroughly wash your hands, knife and cutting board.
Place the ingredients in a large bowl. Add salt and ground pepper. Add vegetable oil if desired. If you do not consider it superfluous.
Stir and serve the appetizer. For a shish kebab or just a juicy ruddy piece of meat. To the fish. Or just put on bread. Just more!

The most pleasant, aromatic and oriental appetite!

How to cook ajapsandal with meat? For reference: Ajapsandali or ajapsandal is a dish of Caucasian cuisine (Georgian, Armenian, Abkhazian etc.). Ajapsandal in translation means "how amazing you are." Ajapsandali is prepared from the essential ingredients: eggplants, tomatoes, bell peppers, onions, garlic, a bunch of cilantro, basil, vegetable oil and salt, pepper to taste. Sometimes potatoes and hot peppers are added, and ajapsandal can also be cooked with meat. What are we going to do now.

Delicious Caucasian dish - ajapsandal with meat... Please note that for cooking ajapsandali with meat, pork can be replaced with veal or beef.

Ajapsandal with meat recipe

5 from 1 reviews

Ajapsandal with meat

Type of dish: Meat dishes

Cuisine: Georgian

Output: 5

Ingredients

• Pork pulp - 250 g,
• onions - 2 heads,
• carrots - 1 pc.,
• eggplant - 2 pcs.,
• sweet pepper - 3 pcs.,
• potatoes - 4 pcs.,
• tomatoes 3-4 - pcs.,
• parsley greens - a bunch,
• garlic - 2 cloves,
• butter 50 g,
• vegetable oil - 2 tbsp. l.,
• ground black pepper
• salt.

Preparation

1. Rinse the pork meat, dry with a paper towel, and then cut into small pieces and fry in a preheated pan with sunflower oil until golden brown.
2. Cut the onions into half rings, and cut the carrots into cubes.
3. Next, add carrots and onions to the meat and fry, stirring occasionally, for another 5-7 minutes.
4. Then, cut off the skin from the eggplant, and cut the bell pepper in half lengthwise, remove the seeds.
5. Cut the eggplants, bell peppers and potatoes into cubes.
6. Finely chop the tomatoes and herbs. Chop the garlic.
7. On the meat fried with onions and carrots, put slices of butter (you can ghee), then in layers: potatoes, eggplant, bell peppers, tomatoes and herbs, sprinkle the layers with salt, pepper and garlic.
8. Simmer ajapsandali for 40 minutes over low heat.
9. When serving, place the ajapsandali with meat on a beautiful dish and decorate with sprigs of herbs.

Bon Appetit!

How to cook ajapsandal with meat? For sparavka: Ajapsandali or ajapsandal is a Caucasian dish (Georgian, Armenian, Abkhazian, etc.). Ajapsandal means "how amazing you are". Ajapsandali is prepared from the essential ingredients: eggplants, tomatoes, bell peppers, onions, garlic, a bunch of cilantro, basil, vegetable oil and salt, pepper to taste. Sometimes potatoes and hot peppers are added, and ajapsandal can also be cooked with meat. What are we going to do now. Let's cook a delicious Caucasian dish - ajapsandal with meat. Please note that for cooking ajapsandali with meat, pork can be substituted for veal or beef. Ajapsandal with meat recipe 5 from 1 reviews Ajapsandal…

Ajapsandal is a stewed vegetable dish popular in several Caucasian countries. The authorship of this unique dish is disputed by Armenians, Georgians, Azerbaijanis, Abkhazians. It is now impossible to establish which of them it belongs to. However, it must be admitted that each nation brought something of its own to the recipe. Ajapsandal in Armenian has much in common with ajapsandal in Georgian or Azerbaijani, but at the same time differs from them. For example, the Armenians choose their own set of spices and herbs for this dish, often include potatoes or carrots in the composition, prepare ajapsandal so liquid that it somewhat resembles a soup, although in fact it is the second course. Armenian ajapsandal turns out to be tasty, aromatic and very useful, as it is prepared from juicy and ripe vegetables rich in all kinds of vitamins.

Cooking features

By itself, ajapsandal is prepared according to certain rules that do not even depend on the recipe. However, the technology of preparing ajapsandal in Armenian has its own peculiarities. If you want to cook this dish of Armenian cuisine, you must follow a number of rules, then the finished dish will be identical in taste and appearance to the traditional one.

• Eggplant is a must-have ingredient without which ajapsandal will immediately turn into a vegetable stew. These vegetables need preliminary preparation, otherwise they will retain solanine, which will give the dish an unpleasant bitter taste. In order to get rid of solanine, eggplants are soaked for 20-30 minutes in a saline solution, for the preparation of which 10 g of salt is added for each liter of water. You can just salt the eggplants and then rinse. It is imperative to rinse the vegetables, otherwise they will turn out to be salty and spoil the taste of the whole dish.
• The second essential ingredient in Armenian ajapsandal is sweet pepper. Preference is given to those varieties that are green. They may not look so beautiful in the finished dish, but they have a richer taste.
• Potatoes are often a part of Armenian ajapsandal. Its cooking time is slightly longer than that of other vegetables. For this reason, it is recommended to fry it slightly beforehand, and then put it in the dish.
• Vegetables for ajapsandal do not need to be fried, in this case it will be dietary. However, more often they are still fried before stewing. Thanks to this, they acquire different flavor notes and retain their shape better when stewing.
• If you cook ajapsandal in Armenian, use butter for frying vegetables. Using vegetable oil instead of butter is possible, but in this case the taste of the dish will be less delicate than that of traditional Armenian ajapsandal.
• Ajapsandal is cooked in a pot with a thick bottom and thick walls. Thanks to this, the vegetables are saturated with the juices and aromas of each other and the spices included in the composition, so that the dish turns out to be very tasty.
• Traditional Armenian ajapsandal is prepared from some vegetables, but ajapsandal with meat is also considered classic. The main thing is that there is not too much meat in it, vegetables should dominate.

Ajapsandal is served both as a side dish for meat and as an independent dish. It is satisfying enough not to need any supplement.

Ajapsandal in Armenian with carrots

• eggplant - 0.5 kg;
• sweet pepper - 0.5 kg;
• carrots - 0.5 kg;
• onions - 100 g;
• garlic - 4 cloves;
• hot chilli pepper - 1 pc.;
• fresh cilantro - 20 g;
• fresh parsley - 20 g;
• fresh basil - 20 g;
• butter - 150 g;
• tomatoes - 1 kg;
• salt, hops-suneli - to taste.

Cooking method:

• Wash the eggplants and cut them in half lengthways without removing the tails. Cut each half lengthwise, just a couple of centimeters or even less before reaching the tails. Salt and let sit for 15 minutes. After the indicated time, rinse well in running water and pat dry with paper towels.
• Put half of the butter in a frying pan, put it on fire. When the butter melts, fry the eggplants on all sides, without separating the oblong pieces from the base.
• Peel the carrots and cut them into strips or thin slices.
• Remove the husk from the onion and cut into thin quarters of rings.
• Chop the garlic finely.
• Wash the peppers, cut off their stalks. Cut each pepper lengthwise into 4 pieces. Cut into quarters into rings about 3-4 mm thick.
• Add the remaining oil to the pan where the eggplant was fried.
• Put onions and carrots in melted butter, fry them for 10 minutes. Add pepper and garlic, continue to fry for another 5 minutes.
• Cut hot peppers into small rings. Extract the seeds from them, as they have an overly pungent taste.
• Fold into a cauldron a mixture of onions, carrots, peppers and garlic, adding hot pepper rings to it. If the pan is deep, the vegetables can be stewed instead of shifting.
• Cut the washed tomatoes into slices and place them on top. Season the dish with salt and season.
• Cover everything with strips of eggplant, cutting them off from the base.
• Cover the frying pan or cauldron with a lid, put on low heat. Simmer the ajapsandal for about half an hour.

Before placing the ajapsandal on the plates, stir it and sprinkle with chopped herbs.

Ajapsandal prepared according to this recipe has a pungent taste. If you are not a fan of hot dishes, you can choose another recipe for ajapsandal in Armenian, which will have a milder taste, or exclude hot peppers from the recipe (the amount of garlic can be left the same).

Ajapsandal in Armenian with meat and potatoes

• lamb or pork - 1 kg;
• eggplant - 0.7 kg;
• tomatoes - 0.5 kg;
• sweet pepper - 0.7 kg;
• potatoes - 0.7 kg;
• onions - 0.25 kg;
• dried basil - 10 g;
• dried rosemary - 5 g;
• bay leaf - 3 pcs.;
• ghee - 50 g;
• salt, pepper - to taste;
• water - how much is required.

Cooking method:

• Wash the meat, pat dry with a tea towel, and cut into medium-sized pieces (about two 2 cm).
• Wash and peel the eggplant. Cut them into large cubes, slightly smaller than the meat.
• Dip the eggplants in salted water, dissolving before this salt in the ratio of 10 g of salt to 1 liter of water. Leave it on for half an hour, then rinse and let dry.
• Pour boiling water over the tomatoes and peel them off. It will be even easier to peel the tomatoes if you do not just pour them with hot water, but immerse them in boiling water for a couple of minutes, having made a cross-shaped incision on the skin before.
• Cut the peeled tomatoes into circles.
• Peel the potatoes. Cut it into the same chunks as the eggplant.
• Wash the peppers. Cut off the areas with the stalk. After slicing each pepper lengthwise, remove the seeds. Cut the peppers into not too thin half rings.
• Cut the peeled onions into thin halves of rings.
• Heat the ghee in a heavy-bottomed saucepan. Fry the onion in it until golden brown.
• Place the meat in a saucepan and fry it with the onions until golden brown.
• Fill the meat with water until it is completely covered with liquid. Wait for the water to boil, add salt, spices, bay leaf and cook the meat for 10 minutes.
• Dip the eggplant pieces into a saucepan, add the potatoes after 5 minutes and wait another 5 minutes. Add pepper, cover everything with tomato circles.
• Simmer vegetables with meat in broth for 40 minutes. Cover the pan with a lid for this time, make the heat low.

When serving, it is advisable to add chopped greens to each plate. You can also add green beans to ajapsandal. For the indicated amount of ingredients, 200-300 g will be enough.

Ajapsandal in Armenian will successfully replace both the first and the second course, which can satisfy a person with an excellent appetite.

Ajapsandali (ajapsandal, ajapsanda) is a Georgian, Armenian and Azerbaijani vegetable dish that resembles our usual eggplant sauté. We will tell you how to cook ajapsandali in several ways and the recipe for canning it in this material, and so that you can do everything without any special difficulties, we offer detailed descriptions of the cooking process with beautiful photos.

Adjapsandali in Georgian

The classic recipe is the basis that can always be supplemented at your discretion. The main rule that must be observed when making ajapsandali in Georgian is not to turn vegetables into porridge, since then it will be a completely different dish.

List of necessary products per 1 kilogram of eggplant:

• ripe juicy tomatoes - 0.5 kg;
• onions - 350 g;
• sweet pepper - 0.5 kg;
• chili - 1 pod;
• fresh basil, cilantro, parsley - handful each;
• garlic - 1 head;
• Odorless Oleina for frying - 300 ml;
• salt, freshly ground black pepper.

Step-by-step instructions for cooking:

1. Wash medium sized eggplants, dry and cut into halves of rings. Put in a bowl, add salt, mix and leave for a while to make the glass bitter.
2. We remove the pods of bell pepper from the stalk and seeds, rinse and cut into strips of centimeter width.
3. Cut the tomatoes into cubes, and the onion into half rings, but not very wide. Chop garlic and chili in thin plates.
4. Pour oil into a thick frying pan and heat well. We squeeze the blue ones from the released juice and fry in parts. They need to be disturbed as little as possible. It is best to put them in enough so that they completely cover the bottom. Thoroughly fry them on both sides, remove them on a plate.
5. In the same skillet, add fat, fry the peppers and then the onions.
6. Simultaneously simmer the tomatoes in another skillet. Everything must be done under the lid so that the juice does not evaporate. At the end of cooking, add the garlic and chili plates, add and pepper, sprinkle with finely chopped fresh herb.
7. Pour a little oil into the brazier and pour the fried vegetables. Gently mix them, fill them with tomato mixture and let them boil slightly for no more than 10 minutes. A tasty and healthy Georgian dish is ready.

Classic Armenian ajapsandal

The Armenian recipe differs slightly in its composition. It is also thinner and more like a soup than a stew. We suggest you make ajapsandal from Stalik Khankishiev.

List of required ingredients:

• 1 kg of pork;
• 700 g of blue and bell peppers;
• hot pepper pod;
• 500 g tomato;
• peeled potatoes - 700 g;
• carrots - 300 g;
• onion - 300 g;
• garlic - half the head;
• dried herbs: basil, rosemary;
• lavrushka - 3 pcs.;
• ghee - 200 g;
• salt, pepper, water.

Description of the cooking process:

1. We cut the washed and dried blue ones into pieces, 3 centimeters wide. Stir with salt and leave for half an hour to make the glass bitter.
2. Cut the peeled potatoes into the same cubes as the eggplants. Cut onions and peppers into not very thin half-rings, carrots - into cubes. Garlic and chili mode in small pieces.
3. Cut the meat into pieces 2 centimeters wide.
4. In a brazier or cauldron, we drown some of the oil. Bring the onions and carrots to golden brown. Add pork and fry until golden brown. Now add liquid enough to completely submerge the meat. We are waiting for everything to boil, then add spices, add salt and let it boil for a short time.
5. Now, every five minutes, we lay blue, potatoes, pepper in turn.
6. Grind with garlic and hot pepper. Remove the peel from the tomatoes, cut them into rings and spread on top of our food.
7. We reduce the temperature to a minimum, close the lid and simmer for a little less than an hour. Pour the finished ajapsandali with meat into plates and sprinkle with fresh chopped herbs.

Adjapsandali in the oven

In a modern kitchen, you can use household appliances to prepare such a tasty and healthy dish. So ajapsandal in the oven is obtained with a richer taste of vegetables.

To make ajapsandal this way you will need:

• 4 eggplants;
• 4 tomatoes;
• 2 pods of sweet pepper;
• 2 onions;
• 1 kg of potatoes;
• ½ head of garlic;
• 100 g spread;
• a little water;
• salt pepper.

Cooking instructions:

1. Blue ones, as usual, need to get rid of bitterness. Therefore, add the regime in pieces of the same size, add and leave for half an hour. Drain the resulting dark liquid.
2. Potato tubers - mode in slices, pepper - in thin strips, onion - in half rings.
3. Divide the tomatoes into slices, after washing and drying them.
4. In a deep heat-resistant form, melt the spread. Fry the onion until transparent, add the potatoes and fry for about 5 minutes. Add the blue ones, gently mix the pepper, add salt, pepper and fry the same amount.
5. Squeeze out the garlic, put the tomato slices and pour in some water. We close the lid and put to stew for half an hour in the oven at 180 degrees.
6. When the vegetables are ready, you can pour fresh herbs into the brazier, cover with a lid just a little. Then ajapsanda will have a pleasant spring scent.

Ajapsandal on the fire on the grill

Vegetables made in this way are perfect for kebabs. And its usefulness is undeniable, since it is prepared without a single drop of fat. And so that everything works out for you exactly as it should, we offer you a step-by-step recipe for ajapsandal, made on the grill.

List of required products:

• blue - 3 pcs.;
• tomatoes - 4 pcs.;
• onion - 3 pcs.;
• sweet pepper - 3 pods;
• garlic - a few cloves;
• greens taste;
• vinegar, vegetable oil - a little.

Cooking description:

1. Ajapsandal on the grill is prepared quite simply. We wash all vegetables, get rid of husks, stalks and seeds. We string them on skewers (except for garlic), which we lay out on the grill net. We bake them until tender.
2. Hot tomatoes and eggplants need to be dipped in cold water for a few minutes, peel them off and cut into large pieces. We cut the rest of the products there. Fill with a few drops of oil and vinegar. Grind with finely chopped garlic and herbs. If desired, you can add salt and grind with ground black pepper.

Adjapsandali for the winter

Such yummy can be easily prepared for the winter. It turns out to be very tasty, slightly spicy.

To prepare it based on 2 half-liter jars, take:

• blue ones - 500 g;
• onion - 200 g;
• mild pepper - 300 g;
• tomatoes - 200 g;
• garlic - 2 cloves;
• tomato paste - 2 tons of spoons;
• Oleina - 100 ml;
• vinegar - 50 ml;
• water - 50 ml;
• salt - 1 tsp;
• sugar - 1.5 tbsp. spoons;
• freshly ground pepper - 0.5 tsp;
• hops-suneli - 3 pinches.

Detailed description:

1. Since we will be preparing for storage in jars for the winter, the dishes must be carefully washed and sterilized.
2. Cut the washed eggplants into halves of rings. Add salt and leave for half an hour, letting the bitterness drain. Then fry them in a frying pan in a small amount of oil until half cooked (about 10 minutes). We put it in a saucepan.
3. Fry the chopped onion until golden, add chopped tomatoes and a little water. Simmer over low heat for about 5 minutes. We put it in a saucepan.
4. Pepper mode in cubes, fry in a skillet covered with a lid for about 10 minutes. Pour it into the rest of the products, add salt, add spices, finely chopped garlic.
5. Mix well and set to stew for 15 minutes, sometimes stir so that the components do not burn. We add vinegar, wait quite a bit and remove the fire.
6. The twist is very hot in cans. We wrap it up overnight and then store it as usual.

If you decide to cook an unusual vegetable dish, then our proposed recipes for delicious ajapsandali will come in handy. Thanks to them, your loved ones will be able to plunge into the atmosphere of real Caucasian cuisine and get a huge supply of vitamins.

Video: Vegetable Ajapsandali

Everyone is familiar with such dishes as shashlik, suluguni, ajapsandali, lula kebab and many, many others. All of them are united by a common origin - the Caucasus! Caucasian cuisine is a rather conventional concept, which always requires some clarification regarding a specific region. Most often, this term means the cuisine of Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. They can also mean the culinary traditions of the peoples of the North Caucasus and Dagestan.

Why, in spite of such ambiguity, do they continue to use this expression? The fact is that the culinary preferences of the peoples of the South Caucasus have much in common. Dishes are prepared from the same ingredients and are often given very similar names. The same is true for the north of the region, but if you start comparing the cuisines of the north and south, the differences will be very significant. So you should always clarify which Caucasian cuisine is meant.

Culinary traditions of the South

It is very easy to single out common denominators that unite Georgian, Armenian and Azerbaijani cuisines - these are meat, various vegetables and herbs, a specific set of spices and, of course, red wine. Many dishes have long gained popularity outside the region, and in order to taste them you do not need to go to Tbilisi or Yerevan. Lobio, khachapuri, lyulya-kebab - all this is familiar to people living in the post-Soviet space.

Meat dishes are very common in the Caucasus. Here they use a wide variety of meat (except for pork, which is not very common even in Christian Armenia or Georgia) - mutton, beef, poultry. It is noteworthy that it is not customary to grind meat with a meat grinder here. Local chefs are able to finely chop the meat with knives, and this is done during the cooking process. It is not customary to store minced meat.

When the words "meat" and "Caucasus" are heard, the third word "shashlik" is certainly heard. Indeed, this, at first glance, dish is the hallmark of the region. There are a lot of recipes for this dish and every nation considers it its national, possessing its own "secret" ingredients. At the same time, always where there is a barbecue, there is also a large amount of vegetables and herbs on the table.

Soups in the Caucasus are always very rich, thick and often contain very unusual ingredients for us. For example, the well-known Georgian kharcho soup is originally prepared with the addition of walnuts. Piti soup is popular in Azerbaijan, where rich bone broth acts as a base. Also, one cannot fail to mention kyufta-bozbash from Azerbaijan and Georgian khash. The first dish is pea and potato soup with meat balls, and the second is giblet and lamb broth with spices.

Pilaf can in no way be called a primordial Caucasian dish, nevertheless, it also became widespread here, although the recipe has undergone a number of changes. Some of these changes are so significant that many question the possibility of calling this dish pilaf. The general and most important change is that rice and meat are cooked separately. In addition, fish, vegetables and even berries are often used.

The mild and rather warm climate of the region contributed to the fact that a wide variety of greens appeared in the local cuisine. In total, the number of herbs and spices is close to two dozen. Pomegranate juice, chopped walnuts, wine vinegar, and all sorts of sauces that deserve special mention are often served as seasonings. It is a very important part of the region's cuisine and is rarely served without sauces.

Some of them are real culinary masterpieces. For example, Georgian tkemali based on wild cherry plum or satsibeli from tomatoes with the addition of saffron and cilantro. Continuing the conversation about the general features of the cuisine of the South Caucasus, one cannot fail to mention the fact that the overwhelming majority of dishes are cooked here over an open fire. Any products are subjected to such processing, which cannot but affect their taste.

Georgian dish ajapsandali: how to cook

Finishing the conversation about the cuisine of the South Caucasus as an example of the common culinary traditions of the peoples of the region, we can cite a recipe for one dish, the name of which does not differ much among different peoples. This is Georgian ajapsandali - a vegetable stew and one of the most popular dishes served with barbecue.

Ingredients:

• 2 eggplant;
• 0.5 kg of potatoes;
• 2 tomatoes;
• 1 sweet pepper;
• 1 onion;
• 3-4 cloves of garlic;
• 1 bunch of cilantro;
• 1 bundle of basil;
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil;
• 25ml water;
• salt, spices.

Preparation:

1. The eggplants are cut into cubes, sprinkled with salt and left for half an hour. Then they are washed and fried. We spread the eggplants, and in the same frying pan, fry the onions, carrots and bell peppers.
2. Peeled tomatoes and garlic are finely chopped and sent to the pan. Add eggplants there. Leave to simmer for 1 minute.
3. Finely chopped herbs and spices are added to the skillet and the dish is stewed for another 10 minutes.

Then let the ajapsandali cool for 30 minutes and serve. By the way, local housewives make ajapsandali for the winter in a special way. By rolling the vegetables listed above into jars, and opening these blanks as needed. There are many options for such a salad, or rather, there are as many as there are housewives, because each brings something of its own to the recipe.

North Caucasian cuisine

In general, the culinary traditions of this region have much in common with the Transcaucasus. The mutual penetration of many dishes is well noticeable, as well as many borrowings from the Turkic peoples. At the same time, the harsher climate and living conditions of the local peoples left their mark. This is noticeable in the variety of dishes and the ingenuity of the use of certain ingredients. In addition, dairy products play a more important role in the north. So, for example, ayran (a fermented milk drink), cheeses, cottage cheese and of course kefir, which, unlike ayran, is a primordially local invention, is very common here. All these products are well-known both in Georgia and in Armenia, they have always been present in the diet in large quantities.

Animal meat (lamb, beef, poultry) was consumed fresh (mainly in summer and autumn, when livestock was being slaughtered and on the occasion of some important event), dried and smoked. At the same time, almost all parts of the carcass were used. So, for example, intestines stuffed with crushed meat, which are dried in the sun, are a typical dish. In general, the use of tripe (ichi) is one of the hallmarks of local cuisine.

If we take fresh meat, then unlike Armenia, it is usually fried here.

It is very common to prepare pies, the recipes of which, given the multinational composition of the region, are great. At the same time, Ossetian recipes can be distinguished separately. They are prepared from yeast dough with a wide variety of fillings: potatoes, onions, cheese, pumpkin, cabbage, but primarily meat.

Of course, despite the large number of common features, which is associated with the rather compact residence of a large number of peoples, the North Caucasian cuisine is not homogeneous. There are several main cuisines - Adyghe (Circassian), Ossetian, Ingush, Karachai. Each of them has its own unique dishes, even though the choice of products is limited.