Tbilisi Prepares to Trademark National Dish

Officials in Georgia hope that obtaining trademark protection for khachapuri, the cheese-filled Georgian pastry that has a lip-smacking fan base throughout the former Soviet Union, can help open new markets in the United States and Western Europe for Georgian cuisine and food products.

Generally a much thinner and much larger cousin of the calzone, khachapuri -- like many other Georgian foods - have inspired rampant imitation throughout the former Soviet Union. In Ukraine and Russia, for example, mushrooms and meat are often added to the pastry, an act most Georgians consider akin to blasphemy.

The Georgian government hopes that a draft law now in the works at the National Intellectual Property Center will help establish a global reputation for khachapuri, and clear the way for Georgia to receive due international credit for the salty cheese pies that are a staple of its cuisine.

Under the law, Georgia would adopt the European Union’s Traditional Specialty Guaranteed (TSG) trademark protection system, which certifies that agricultural products or foodstuffs are produced using location-specific ingredients and traditional processing methods. No creative liberties would be allowed.

The Ministry of Agriculture is expected to submit the law to parliament by the end of the year.

The TSG certification would not keep producers outside Georgia from churning out khachapuri-wanna-be products, but it would forbid them from calling the foreign pastries khachapuri, unless they make use of ingredients and preparation processes specified by Georgia’s National Intellectual Property Center.

Getting countries to honor the TSG requirements for khachapuri would depend on bilateral agreements. Georgia has such an agreement with Ukraine and plans to strike up a similar deal with the European Union that would allow extending TSG protection rules to all 27 members of the bloc.

"This may not produce an immediate benefit for Georgian farmers or the economy, but in the long run, it will help secure the good reputation of Georgian food," Agriculture Minister Bakur Kvezereli told EurasiaNet.org.

Not only khachapuri would benefit from the trademark protection. Similar certification would also extend to other Georgian dishes, including suluguni, a sourish, salty cheese that is the key ingredient for khachapuri, and to tkemali, a sour plum sauce served alongside beef or as part of other dishes.

So far, wine has been the main focus of the Georgian government’s certification activities; 18 brands for export bear certifications linking their characteristics and reputation to their Georgian origin.

Expecting Russia to honor any such trademark protection may be an idle hope. Moscow banned the import of Georgian agricultural products in 2006, but the Russian capital’s Georgian restaurants still reportedly retain their popularity. [For details see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Government officials in Tbilisi entertain visions of Georgian food and drink becoming as popular at ethnic restaurants in the United States or Western Europe as they currently are in Russia. Plans are being developed for an intergovernmental agreement with the United States that would recognize trademarks for Georgia’s organic fruit and vegetables, as well as for khachapuri, according to Minister Kvezereli.

Darra Goldstein, author of "The Georgian Feast," a 1993 compendium of Georgian recipes and food traditions, believes that Georgian food has a chance to catch on in the United States.

"I have thought for years that someone should open khachapuri stands in the United States -- they could be the next wave of designer pizzas, and khinkali [a Georgian dumpling] the next new ravioli," Goldstein, founder of the Massachusetts-based food journal Gastronomica, emailed EurasiaNet.org. "But, at least in the States, Georgian cuisine is not particularly well known, except in cities where a large number of Georgians or Russians have settled, such as New York and Los Angeles."

Several restaurants in the United States offer Georgian food of varying quality, but often included as part of a hodgepodge of ex-Soviet cuisines targeted at recent immigrants. To make Georgian food popular in the United States, Georgia needs to bring in more American tourists, Goldstein advised. "That is how Italian food became so popular here (as late as the 1960s it was disdained, but then people started traveling to Tuscany, and attitudes changed)," she wrote. "The same thing happened with Thai food."

Twentieth-century Georgian ethnographer Tedo Sakhokia traced khachapuri’s origins to medieval Georgia’s northwestern mountains. As the pastry’s popularity spread over time, various regions produced their own variations, ranging from a boat-shaped bread with a lavish cheese-and-egg topping to a calzone-style pie with hard-boiled eggs inside.

Georgian bakers interviewed by EurasiaNet.org expressed surprise that khachapuri has not spread to American consumers, as well. One Tbilisi baker cautioned, though, that preparing the perfect khachapuri involves more than just mixing the right ingredients.

"You can make it in America, but things like khachapuri are not just about sticking to the recipe, adding this much salt or water, "said baker Nana Tsanava. "It takes these and this," she said, pointing to her hands and heart, respectively.