Birthday Party in Gverdzineti!

Last Sunday, I travelled to a nearby village with my host mum for the birthday party of her friend and colleague, Guliko.  It was Guliko's 50th birthday, so it was a big one! (Imagine my surprise at discovering that she did most of the work cooking, preparing, etc. and didn't spend nearly enough time just enjoying the party!  Alas, that's the life of a Georgian woman...especially, I think, in the villages.)

There was a VAST amount of food, as is common for Georgian "supras".  It pretty fascinating how the table is typically set for one of these big dinner parties.  Everyone has small plates in front of them (sometimes two, stacked up, so that you can switch to a clean/new plate sometime during the dinner), and the table is covered with dishes. Empty space is frowned upon. If you ever been to a Korean dinner/res taurant, you have an idea of what I mean.  There is typically no passing of the dishes -- everyone should be able to reach everything from where they are seated.  If, for example, one of the foods being served is eggplant with walnut paste, then there will be as many small dishes of eggplant on the table as necessary for everyone to have easy access.   When the table gets too full, they just stack plates of food on top of each other.  It is very important to give the appearance of abundance; no serving dishes are ever left on the table empty!  They are constantly being re-filled/topped up from the kitchen. The upside is that the table always looks fresh and inviting.  The downside is that the lady (or ladies) of the house never have a chance to rest!

The party was a lot of fun.  There was much vino drinking! (Of course, not by me -- only a little!) In Georgian supras, there is a toastmaster, who constantly makes toasts, and asks others to make toasts.  It is taboo to take ANY drink without first toasting...hence the need for constant toasts by the toastmaster.  For men, the tradition is to "bottoms up" (i.e., drink the whole glass, about the size of a small juice glass) with each toast. Not surprisingly, this leads to a lot of drunkenness at these things.  Fortunately for me, women are able to get away with taking just a sip with each toast.  Still, it's a bit difficult to gauge just HOW much you're drinking, because, just as the food serving dishes are never allowed to get empty, the wine glasses are constantly being topped up.  Here again, the goal is abundance.

Here are some fun pics:

 Before the party... The pitchers are full of house-made wine.  White, in this case.  

 Some of the ladies across the table from me.  They're all related...somehow.   The cream-colored dish near the center-right of the picture is one of my favorites.  It is turkey or chicken in a flavorful sauce made with ground walnuts.  Delish!

 This is my host mom, after she made a toast.  She's drinking out of a special clay bowl for this toast.  And yes, she drank the whole thing!

 This is my spot.  Notice how the plates of food are stacked on top of each other!

 This is the toastmaster, or tamada, at this dinner.  In this particular toast, he's using the ram's horn, which is a traditional Georgian thing.  The idea is that there is no way to drink from the horn without drinking it all, because you can't put it down! (Actually, I found a loophole.  You can always pour what you don't drink from the horn into your glass on the table, although I'm pretty sure that's a very girly and/or UN-Georgian thing to do!)

The birthday girl and her cake, with daughter and granddaughters.