“When Georgian soldiers went to war, they would always carry a sapling in their pocket so that if they died, a vine would grow,” Burjanadze explains. In the late summer haze, none of us challenge whether this is fact or myth—the telling of it is what matters most. This country has been unfortunate to reside in the overlapping arcs of conquering empires: Russian, Persian, and Ottoman, to name the most recent. Some were religiously opposed to alcohol and were known to have slashed and burned Georgian vines during their time.
Yet amid changing regimes, wine’s perseverance has allowed Georgians to maintain a continuous sense of identity, and the pride of being the world’s oldest winemakers. In 2017, fragments of wine jars discovered South of Tbilisi confirmed what Georgians had always known: that their relationship with the elixir has stretched back at least 8,000 years.
We open a 2021 Rkatsiteli, and the natural wine looks cloudy and honey-colored in our glasses. I expect it to be funky from a first whiff, but upon sipping I discover citrus fruits and a delicate structure of tannins; there’s an aftertaste like black tea with a slice of lemon. Rkatsiteli is an ancient grape, which is still turned into wine using traditional production methods—a poster child, of sorts, for the storied wines that Georgians take such pride in.
Our afternoon is spent crushing grapes in a wooden hand-cranked machine, though we know that this final burst of effort is just an intermission before more imbibing. Come evening, we return to the long tables, now laid out with Georgian salads of tomato, cucumber, walnuts, and cilantro with bread, and cold entrées like nigvziani badrijani, thin strips of eggplant wrapped around pomegranate and walnut mash to form bite-sized rolls. This is the start of the supra, which literally translates to tablecloth, as tablecloths are used only when guests attend. A supra is not a regular booze-up but a ritualized feast of toasting, communing, and drinking. Burjanadze serves as tamada, the toastmaster, a role that demands eloquence, humor, passion, and a tolerance for the quantities of wine that will be thrown back, as revelers look on with raised glasses.
Round after round, Burjanadze urges us to toast family, ancestors, mother nature, and world peace, as platters of roast pork shashlik and meat dumplings called khinkali are brought out. Bottles of red Saperavi and more Rkatsiteli are endlessly replenished, when Bacho invites us to fuel the toasting ourselves.