Kargi Gogo went from being one of Portland’s best food trucks serving up khatchapuri and khinkali to the hipster masses to an online vendor of Georgian food and wine themed products as well as Georgian spices. Check out their site for gifts ranging from Khinakli t-shirts and socks from Alter Socks, Khinkali tree ornaments to adjika. Kargi gogo is your one stop shop for all things Georgian.

For the inquisitive #winelover, Blue Danube is offering a six-bottle variety pack for 99$. Members of their wine club receive free shipping. It is a generous offer and a perfect time to introduce a variety of Georgian wines including one from our favorite wine producer, Gotsa.

For the travel lover, Taste Georgia is offering gift certificates for our tours that are redeemable at any time. Check out our website. Our cooking classes are always a popular choice. And through December 23rd, we are offering a 15% discount to all bookings, two person minimum.

“Gaumarjos!” Victory! To Georgia!” The ubiquitous Georgian host breaks bread and all around the table are satiated and happy. Why not? It’s been a stimulating evening of conversations and arguments. An evening, it feels, that’s been repeated many times over the last year or so. There’s that infamous tablecloth, the high ceilings, the rooms full of art and artifacts all contributing to an ambiance with character. Eko’s flawless wines however are of course the focus.

Georgia’s capital city, Tbilisi, is a fun and exciting city for travellers to enjoy its rich tapestry of colliding cultures, eat fantastic Georgian cuisine and drink wine from all of Georgia’s wine regions. As the capital of the land that gave us wine 8000 years ago, it’s no surprise that Tbilisi offers up some of the best wine bars in the country. Here are my top four…

Living dangerously. Iago opens his first sparkling wine
Natural wine aficionados will no doubt be familiar with the term “Pét Nat” which is short for Pétillant Natural, a style of sparkling wine otherwise known as Methode Ancestrale, a traditional style of sparkling wine production that dates back centuries, a style of wine that is becoming more and more popular at natural wine fairs throughout Europe. As natural wine producers from Georgia have been attending these fairs for a number of years, it was only a matter of time before this style of wine should make a debut in the homeland of wine itself. Just as the foreign influence of female wine makers on Georgian wine has produced a new generation of women in wine, Georgians are embracing this Pet Nat style and making great wines. Georgians have a special and notable talent for maintaining tradition while progressively working towards the future. Wine is about people and communication, and it is exciting that a country with an 8000+ year wine history is open to the influence of wine styles from across the globe.

Pétillant Natural wines are sparkling wines that have been made for centuries in Europe and are often refereed to as farmhouse sparkling wine. It is a very simple style of wine making that results in deliciously fresh and lightly sparkling wines, perfect for what meteorologists are predicting will be Europe’s hottest summer since the deadly 2003. The basic method is allowing the wine to ferment normally, but before fermentation is completed vignerons bottle the wine while there are still sugars that haven’t fermented yet, and fermentation continues in the closed bottle. The reconditioning in the bottle creates CO2 that has nowhere to escape and voila! Bubbles! Usually wine makers choose to leave the yeast in the bottle (often labeled sur lie), so these wines are often not as clear as their more commercial cousins Champagne and Prosecco. Unlike the Champagne method or Charmat method produced sparkling wines, no additional yeasts or sugars are added. Fermentation is completed in the bottle.

It turns out that a French man by the name of Vincent Jullien was the first to make Pétillant Natural wine in Georgia. He was at the tasting and was a delightful addition to our group of wine lovers and vignerons. He was charming and an obviously well integrated foreign addition to the natural wine movement in Georgia. I asked him why he wanted to make a Pet Nat in Georgia and he said he wanted to be able to make a wine with zero added sulfites. With grapes from Ateni, a region with limestone soils that create wines high in acidity that is perfect for both sparkling wine and natural wine.

We started the tasting with two Pet Nats I brought from Italy then moved onto three Georgians. There are currently four producers making this style in Georgia and we got to taste four of them. Three at Vino Underground and one at Iago’s a couple of days later. Two were made from qvevri wine and the other two were made in stainless steel. All were well made and very pleasant to drink, and I hope to see them in the western markets soon. On a personal level I really enjoyed the earthy quality the qvevri imparted on the wines, and I learned that every Georgian wine I like doesn’t have to be an orange wine. I have come to prefer wine made from the Chinuri grape without skin contact.

• Okro’s Wine, Mtsvane-Jon Okruashvili of Okro’s Wine was the first of this new generation of vignerons to make a qvevri pet nat. We tasted his Mtsvane, but I have also tasted his Rkatsiteli. John crushed the grapes and started fermentation in qvevri and then after 14 or 15 days when the brix level reached 2.5, he bottled it for fermentation. Golden apples, toasty notes, earthiness with racy acidity and bubbles that danced on the tongue. It was well rounded and well balanced.
• Jakelli, Chinuri and Mtsvane Goruli-Malkhaz is more well known for his delightfully wonderful Saperavi, but his Pet Nat is certainly a wine to look out for. It is made with 60% Chinuri and 40% Goruli Mtsvane. He fermented in tanks until the brix level reached 2 and then bottled for reconditioning the bottle. There is no skin contact, so this is a well made white wine with a tropical nose, ripe apples and minerality, a really enjoyable wine for the summer. I hope it is on the market soon.
• Art Villa Garikula, Chinuri and Mtsvane Goruli-Vincent Jullien is a French man who married a Georgian women and is the man responsible for bringing the pét nat craze to Georgia. Like Malkhaz he makes his with a Chinuri/Goruli blend in Ateni. Made in steel tanks and then reconditioned in the bottle and disgorged, so his wine is not sur lie (on the yeasts). It was the most elegant of the four wines, with more of a suggestion of must aroma and citrus. On the palate it had just the slightest residual sugar that danced on the tongue. A truly well made wine.
• Iago’s Winery, Chinuri- I tasted this wine back in December when Ettore and I visited, so the reconditioning the bottle was not yet completed and the wine was still more on the grape juice side than wine. On a more recent day trip to Kartli, our final winery stop was at Iago’s winery where we tasted a number of his wines including his now gorgeous 100% Chinuri pét nat. This wine was like drinking a song. Iago made the wine without skin contact in the qvevri and when the wine reached about 2 or 3 brix he bottled it. Really well balanced, fresh and toasty notes, with a firm earthiness that I have come to associate with wine made in qvevri

Thank you so much to Ramaz Nikoladze and Malkhaz Jackelli for answering my countless messages on Facebook about how pét nats are made. It took a tasting in Georgia for me to finally comprehend. Thanks so much Ramaz for setting up this tasting! Thanks to all the vignerons for sharing their wine expertise. It was a wonderful and informative evening.

NO PART OF THIS BLOG POST CAN BE COPIED OR REPRODUCED WITHOUT AUTHOR PERMISSION.

Special thanks to Erica Firpo for helping me with the title

Marina and Tea of Mandili presenting their wine at Vignaioli Naturali a Roma 2015 an annual natural wine fair in Rome >Last spring I met Georgia’s first female owned wine company and have had the privilege of following them for an entire year, from vineyard to qvevri, to bottling. In Georgia, men have traditionally been in control of the 8,000 year old qvevri wine making process, so these women, along with another young woman named Mariam Iosebidze who started her own wine company in 2014, are at the forefront of a change in culture and attitudes towards women in Georgia. I have interviewed these women and tasted their wine and I would like to share their stories over the next few months. For now, a short introduction to the First Ladies of Georgian wine; Marina Kurtanidze and Tea Melanashvili of Mandili. To preface, Tea is my very good friend, she is simply someone I adore, and Marina is a dear friend as well who is a force to be reckoned with. Besides friendship, they have been a big part of my shift in thinking about how women in the west view women in other parts of the world. In short, we believe that we have it better and that those “other” women are not as liberated. Before I went to Georgia, I was told that it was an extremely sexist country where women were not treated well and that, in fact, I should avoid going there. So during my first trip, I made a few cultural faux pas having this attitude in the back of my head. I met Tea at Vino Underground, a wine bar in Tbilisi that focuses on natural wines, and learned that she was one of Georgia’s first female wine makers. I was intrigued. How could it be possible in this country? We tasted her wine, and I was hooked. Not only was I impressed with Tea for making strides in the wine world, I was impressed with her wine, Mandili. Mandili was established in 2012 as a collaboration between two friends who were inspired by female vignerons- such as Elizabetta Foradori -that Georgian producers have met at the European natural wine fairs. Marina is married to Iago Bitarishvili of Iago’s Winery, so she has been a part of the wine making process for her entire life in everything but name. In fact, it was her husband, Iago, who first encouraged Marina to make wine. The name Mandili means a ladies scarf (or veil), and their label depicts a woman dancing with a scarf. The team decided to purchase organic mtsvane grapes from Kakheti and bring them to marani in Kartli where they made their wine in qvevri. Their first wine was an incredible success, not only for the innovation in traditional wine making in Georgia but the wine was of extremely high quality. Both women explained that they wanted to make a wine that was both Georgian and also conveyed the essence of creation by women. They chose the mtsvane grape because they both really love wines made from that grape and they were able to buy wines from very healthy vineyards. They weren’t alone in the process. They had the help of friends and encouragement from fellow qvevri producers. In fact, they did not experience any kind of negativity in the tight knit wine community in Georgia and have only had encouragement from their colleagues and friends. Both Tea and Marina told me about the anxiety of waiting for their wine while it aged in the qvevri for 6 months. Unlike modern styles of wine, a winemaker making wine in qvevri can’t check and taste the wine on a regular basis. After fermentation is completed, the qvevri is sealed and it is a waiting game. They are not the first to describe waiting for their wine as akin to waiting for the birth of a child. They were anxious to know if it was good, what it would taste like and would it taste like “their” wine. In qvevri winemaking you have to trust in Mother Nature to move things along at

Marina and Tea of Mandili presenting their wine at

Vignaioli Naturali a Roma 2015 an annual natural wine fair in Rome >Last spring I met Georgia’s first female owned wine company and have had the privilege of following them for an entire year, from vineyard to qvevri, to bottling. In Georgia, men have traditionally been in control of the 8,000 year old qvevri wine making process, so these women, along with another young woman named Mariam Iosebidze who started her own wine company in 2014, are at the forefront of a change in culture and attitudes towards women in Georgia. I have interviewed these women and tasted their wine and I would like to share their stories over the next few months. For now, a short introduction to the First Ladies of Georgian wine; Marina Kurtanidze and Tea Melanashvili of Mandili. To preface, Tea is my very good friend, she is simply someone I adore, and Marina is a dear friend as well who is a force to be reckoned with. Besides friendship, they have been a big part of my shift in thinking about how women in the west view women in other parts of the world. In short, we believe that we have it better and that those “other” women are not as liberated. Before I went to Georgia, I was told that it was an extremely sexist country where women were not treated well and that, in fact, I should avoid going there. So during my first trip, I made a few cultural

Marina and Tea of Mandili presenting their wine at

Vignaioli Naturali a Roma 2015 an annual natural wine fair in Rome >Last spring I met Georgia’s first female owned wine company and have had the privilege of following them for an entire year, from vineyard to qvevri, to bottling. In Georgia, men have traditionally been in control of the 8,000 year old qvevri wine making process, so these women, along with another young woman named Mariam Iosebidze who started her own wine company in 2014, are at the forefront of a change in culture and attitudes towards women in Georgia. I have interviewed these women and tasted their wine and I would like to share their stories over the next few months. For now, a short introduction to the First Ladies of Georgian wine; Marina Kurtanidze and Tea Melanashvili of Mandili. To preface, Tea is my very good friend, she is simply someone I adore, and Marina is a dear friend as well who is a force to be reckoned with. Besides friendship, they have been a big part of my shift in thinking about how women in the west view women in other parts of the world. In short, we believe that we have it better and that those “other” women are not as liberated. Before I went to Georgia, I was told that it was an extremely sexist country where women were not treated well and that, in fact, I should avoid going there. So during my first trip, I made a few cultural

Mandili 2012-Isn’t she lovely? I was able to taste their 2014 Mandili before bottling, it took a bit of time to open up, but once it did, the power and life in that glass was evident. It will premier at he New Wine Festival in Tbilisi, March 9th, 2015. I will be there on the sidelines cheering for their success.

For more information, contact me at Taste Georgia

Ruben Tkeshelashvili

Some knew him as “The General,” others, simply as Ruben.  He was a qvevri wine maker in Racha, a mountainous region in the Republic of Georgia known for a semi-sweet red wine called Khvanchara. Local legend says that Stalin was a fan of his wine. We were visiting Iago’s Winery last weekend when I happened to mention to my friend Irakli that he really needed to pay a visit to Ruben before he died. Iago told us he had died two days previous.  I think he was a national treasure.  I had the honor of visiting his marani last October with my Rachan guide Natia and my friend Nicoletta.  I went to Racha to lean how to make a bean pastry called lobiani, but I was also on a mission to meet Ruben.  We visited him unannounced one morning and he was there, in his camouflaged glory, grumbling to himself about the inconvenience.  A grumpy, opinionated old man whose eyes sparkled with the joy of living.

He was alone now, but he spoke proudly of his highly educated granddaughter who spoke perfect English.  His qvevri were buried under about a foot of mud. He placed some snacks on a table in his marani and then went to work to open one for us with the help of local young vigneron, Aleco Sardanashvili.  They poured the luscious and precious wine into a doki, with small glasses that resembled Turkish tea glasses, we toasted to our health, to Georgia, to our families and many other ideas and things.  Natia informed me we had to toast and accept the wine and to drink it with him or we would be breaking all the laws of hospitality.  By about 11am, I was completely inebriated.  He poured another doki, and we, his guests, had to toast.  Passing the toasting to another person in Georgian is called, Alaverdi (like the wine making monastery in Kakheti).

In short, it was a moment in my life that I will never forget. Visiting an old man in his 80s, who was still making traditional qvevri wine and honoring the ancient codes of Georgian hospitality-whose eyes had seen many changes in the world and who remained steadfast,-was an honor.  As the Georgians say- he has moved on.  The world will never have another like him. I am consoled knowing that there are young vignerons like Aleco Sardanashvili who continue this tradition in Racha.

Thank you to Natia for organizing this visit for me.  It was a huge honor.

GAANATLOS RUBEN!  May you rest in peace!

Orange Wine for Beginners

By Taste Georgia

The sublime orange wine from the Alaverdi Monastery in Kakheti, Republic of Georgia

When I was first introduced to orange wine, I had no idea what to expect – is it wine flavored with orange peel? Is it some kind of more complex alcoholic beverage made from fermented oranges? Or is it none of the above? Turns out, it’s the latter. This trendy new wine phenomenon has nothing at all to do with citrus. Believe it or not, orange wine is made from the same white grapes that make traditional wine. Orange wine is, simply put, wine made from these white grapes, but produced and fermented like red. New to the world of wine as I am, however, I need more than the simple definition to gain an actual understanding of what orange wine is. When making a traditional white

wine, producers crush the grapes, immediately separating the juice from the skins before fermentation. When making a red wine, however, producers leave the grapes to macerate and ferment with their skins, a vital part of flavor development that contributes to the red wine’s color, texture, and bitterness. The discarded skins from white grapes contain color pigments and tannins that detract from the light and bright flavor typical of white wine. However, although leaving the grapes in contact with their skins doesn’t produce the “typical” flavor, it produces something equally desirable: a smoky, spicy, acidic, and orange wine that pairs well with almost all savory dishes. Although this wine trend may only recently be gaining popularity among modern wine enthusiasts, its roots can be traced back thousands of years to Armenia and Georgia. It’s how white wines used to be made, and it’s now experiencing a renaissance from wineries in northern Italy, Georgia, Croatia, Slovenia, and parts of France and California. If you sip an orange wine with the expectation that it will be light like a white, you will be entirely thrown off. That is why some people initially dislike the stronger, more pungent taste. These wines may take some getting used to; but even I enjoyed the complex flavors I tasted in the orange wine Sarah introduced me to at Litro. Orange wine is usually made in small quantities by small producers, so they don’t come cheap and cannot be picked up at your local supermarket. In researching online, I kept running into a few labels that reviewers frequently recommended – Gravner and Vodopivec from Italy, and Lagvinari from Georgia. If you can’t locate these, just find a natural wine bar and try a glass, served at cellar temperature, as a test run. If you try it with an open mind, I’m willing to bet that you will enjoy the indescribable flavors that explode from the smallest sip of orange wine. If you are interested in organizing a tasting of Orange Wine, please feel free to contact us.

Realizing that I am used to orange wine at this point, I take it for granted that many wine consumers are not and this may make approaching them intimidating. Two weeks ago,  I asked Antiqua Tours intern Anna to write a short post to introduce these spectacular wines to the general public.  She did a great job!