There was great attendance in Georgia at the initiatives organised for the Week of Italian Cuisine in the World, which featured cultural insights, tastings and special discounts on Italian products offered by a number of partner enterprises.
Michelin-starred chef Carlo Cracco took centre stage: for a gala dinner held at Filini Restaurant in Tbilisi, he prepared a menu through which, as he said himself, he wanted to highlight and rediscover the traditional flavours of Italian cuisine by combining them with innovation.
There was great attendance at the event held by Andrea Pieroni, renowned ethnobotanist from the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo, on the connection between culture, flavours and territories, hosted at the National Parliamentary Library of Georgia. Georgian food traditions (starting with the popular banquet, the “supra”) were mentioned at the event, since they too are an expression of the Mediterranean world that revolves around Italian cuisine. The event ended with a sampling of fine wines from Piedmont, presented and compared to the local wines prepared using the traditional Qvevri method.
Symbolic recipes of the Mediterranean diet were the subject of the cooking show “Amid flavours and attention to nutritional values,” by young chef Alessandro Simioli, which was greatly appreciated by hundreds of participants. Limoncello, on the other hand, along with other Italian liqueurs, took centre stage at an evening organised for beverage sector operators.
The Week ended with an award ceremony for the winners of the “Opere di Pasta” competition, organised by the Tbilisi Committee of the Dante Alighieri Society with the support of the Italian Embassy, in which 44 young Georgian sculptors took part, having to deal with a very special raw material: pasta, the cornerstone of Italian cuisine.
