|S| The making of: Khinkali

Khinkali ready to cook

The making off

Dimitri at work

Thanks to the traditional feast yesterday, we have some fresh meat in the house from the sheep Nodar offered. This can now be used to create a typical Georgian meal, known as 'khinkali'. The sheep is, directly after killing it, cut into pieces by an experienced shepherd friend of Nodar and divided amongst two families. Sanata, Nodar's mother, takes the fresh meat home by horse. She first cuts it into small pieces before adding some onions from the garden and a fresh chili pepper. Than she chops it to minced meat. Dimitri, a youth friend of Nodar who's on a visit, takes the preparation of the dough to his credit. Adding water to flour, he turns this to dough by some strong movements of his hands and fists. It is obviously not the first time this guy makes dough! He uses a glass bottle to spread the dough out on the table, till he has a nice flat 5mm layer.

The first step of making the khinkali is pushing some circles out of the flattened dough with a wooden form. The circles need to be flattened again with the bottle before you can start filling it up with the minced meat. One spoon of meat is added in the middle and than Sanata showed us how to close it into a nice looking (money)bag. Not easy and practice is necessary! Boiled for just seven minutes, they were ready to eat. At 10 AM, these khinkali were a gift out of heaven for us. And of course, with a glass of wodka it tastes even better.

Tradition obliges!