The Deserter’s Market (originally started by deserting soldiers) is one of two public markets in Tbilisi, somehow I missed it completely the last time I was in Georgia. We took a tour through it and saw/tasted some amazing things, herbs and spices and honey and local yogurt, really good stuff.
Before the actual market we tasted bread made at a local monastery, the bread is hard to describe, somewhere between regular bread and flatbread with a thin crispy crust, the bread might be the best thing I’ve tried in Georgia, consistently excellent. You can see the baker below grabbing loaves from the oven (tome).
The flour lady, a very interesting and lively woman selling all sorts of mostly cornflour flours, rightly proud of her stacks of flour that never spill.
Honey from different regions around Georgia, all of it good.
Butcher shop… yup, no refrigeration, was a warm day too….
Another butcher.
The pickle guy, really nice pickles, one common one is the pickled flowers of a local shrub, really nice.
Nuts, spices, dried fruit. There are several spices endemic to Georgian cooking that are not really available outside the region so we picked up some marigold powder and some blue fenugreek to try and make a few dishes at home.
This is a Georgian bar, there are rows of these, a table, a tv, some snacks that look frightening, some awful local moonshine (in the coke bottles) called Chacha and the absolute worst of the local wine, watered down turpentine. Really cool!
Another bar.
A Bit Gone 