I visited Tbilisi for the festive season, and apart from beautiful places and Christmas lights, I discovered a foodie’s paradise.
Tbilisi is a perfect destination for food lovers, offering a wide range of options that goes from traditional Georgian dishes to vegan options. Spoiler: it’s always a delicious experience!
On this post you will discover all you need to know to find the best food in Tbilisi.
Best Food in Tbilisi
Best Food in Tbilisi
Georgian food is really varied. Every region in the country creates different dishes and recipes. Generally speaking, they use a lot of walnuts, cheese, and basil in their kitchen.
You can’t leave Tbilisi without trying the following dishes:
- Khachapuri: traditional cheese-filled breed. It has many different regional variations.
- Lobiani: bean-stuffed khachapuri.
- Ghobi: a bowl with appetizers that includes jonjoli, cheese assortments, pkhali, pickles, beans and cornbread.
- Khinkhali: Georgian soup dumpling.
- Pkhali: beetroot, walnut and spinach paste.
- Lobio: mashed beans with spices.
- Adjika: delicious chilli paste
- Churchkhela: traditional sweet that you will see for sale in street food stalls. They look like colorful sausages but they’re actually walnuts covered with grape juice.
Wine in Tbilisi
Georgia is one of the oldest wine-producers in the world – and of course they’re proud of it!
One of the most incredible things is the traditional Qvevri wine, stored underground in terracota containers. So special – it’s worth trying it!
You can book a wine tasting tour in Tbilisi here.
If you have extra days, you can visit Khakheti wine region on a day tour. You can book it here.
And if you don’t drink alcohol, order a homemade lemonade. They’re available in many restaurants and I loved it.
Tbilisi for Vegans
I’m not a vegan, but I try to follow a vegan diet (or at least vegetarian) whenever I can, especially when traveling.
During my days in Tbilisi it was not difficult to follow a vegan diet. Most of restaurants have plenty of options, and only a couple of restaurants were more limited in terms of variety.
For vegan restaurants in Tbilisi, check Happy Cow.
Best Restaurants in Tbilisi
Culinarium Kasheria
23, Abano St
If you can visit only one place, go to Culinarium Kasheria.
Not only this place is cozy and stylish. It also has the most amazing food we had during our days in Tbilisi.
Its name, Culinarium Kasheria, comes from its origin. This place used to be a kasheria, meaning that it’s specialized in food that works as a cure for the hangover. They still preserved these dishes, and we ordered a mix of everything. I literally ate only the starters as we ordered too much food and I used a great amount of adjika, too – everything was delicious!
Fabrika
8 Egnate Ninoshvili St
Fabrika is a must see place when visiting Tbilisi. This place has everything from restaurants to co-working spaces, art galleries and so on. I really enjoyed visiting the outside as it has so many graffitis and murals that worth a visit.
Food-wise though, it may be not as good as the others. I ordered a vegan burger and I really loved their hummus.
Shavi Lomi
28 Zurab Kvlividze St
Shavi Lomi is one of the most interesting restaurants we visited in Tbilisi. It’s a bit out of town, but still really worths the extra effort.
Shavi Lomi means “black lion”, like the one they have painted in the outside of the building. This place grabs your attention from its painted main door to the little details, like the flea market furniture, table-cloth and china they use.
The Georgian food was amazing and I really recommend ordering ghobi, which is served in a huge wooden bowl and it’s fantastic.
Plus, they have some friendly cats at the front door waiting to welcome you.
Kafe Leila
8 Ioane Shavteli St
I really loved everything at Kafe Leila. They offer Persian, Arabic and Georgian food, including a few vegan and vegetarian options!
Its Middle-Eastern decoration creates a very cozy atmosphere. Highly recommended!
Stamba
14, 0108 Merab Kostava St
I loved the design at Stamba – so trendy and stylish!
They offer a mix of European and Georgian traditional dishes, and they have vegan and vegetarian options, too.
It’s not the cheapest from this list but its food really worths the investment!
Zala
24 Tamar Chovelidze St
Zala’s owner, Levan, left his corporate career to open this restaurant where he wanted to make their guests feel like at home. Because of that, he welcomes everyone, asks your name and takes care of your experience. Such a sweet touch that makes me recommend it.
On another note, they had just a few vegan options to choose but everything was delicious.
Veriko
1 Vasil Petriashvili Street
Veriko is the trendiest restaurant in Tbilisi: you will notice if you go there! The atmosphere is really lively.
They offer Georgian traditional dishes with a modern twist and great wines. They have as well vegetarian and vegan options.
My favorite dishes here where pkhali and lobiani – the wine was really good too!
Lolita
7, Tamar Chovelidze St
Lolita was the first restaurant I visited in Tbilisi – it was right in front of the hotel we were staying at so it was really convenient!
They have an open kitchen so you can see how they are preparing your food! They have a mix of international and Georgian food in their menu, and as it was my first meal in Tbilisi I went for the Khachapuri but the avocado salad was a great option, too!
I hope to see Tbilisi somewhere in the near future 🙂 Thanks Diana for these amazing food snaps haha now I am hungry!
OMG, these look amazing! I have never been to Georgia, but it is now on my (long) list!