Series of events « Gout de France / Good France »
By Mariam Chanishvili
Wednesday, March 20
French Gastronomy Week in Georgia: The event will be held on March 18-22.
The Gout de France/Good France project has been organized on the initiative of Alain Ducasse and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs annually.
Around 150 countries around the world, restaurants, and embassies offer numerous dinners to celebrate France’s gastronomy by inviting the public to share a “French dinner”. In each participating restaurant, the event pay tribute to a vibrant, open and innovative cuisine, while remaining true to its values of sharing, pleasure, respect for good food and for the planet.
Now, more than ever, gastronomy is a leading aspect of France and its culture. It is a genuine pull factor for 60% of tourists visiting the country.
In 2019, for the fifth time, the chefs around the whole world celebrate the culinary heritage, the art of eating well, characteristic of French culture.
Georgian chefs will be offering the French dinner as well. The 2019 event will be dedicated to such topics as sustainable gastronomy and local soil.
The chefs selected, in Georgia as elsewhere, will offer the evening on March 21, on 5 continents and in more than 150 countries, a dinner "a la francaise".
Jean-Pierre Xiradakis, a world-renowned chef, is visiting Georgia on the occasion of Gout de France. His restaurant, La Tupina, has been internationally recognized by The New York Times, The Washington Post etc.
During their stay in Georgia, French chefs will cook with Georgian chefs using local products to highlight the link between gastronomy and sustainability. They will taste the products of the monastery Ude and Phoka from Samtskhe-Javakheti, in order to get to know the local culinary tradition and to promote it.
They will taste products made from local endemic wheat species in Kakheti, Eastern Georgia. French chefs will cook a French meal alongside the monks of Alaverdi Monastery. The meal will be elaborated with the local and seasonal Georgian products and will be respectful of the constraints related to Lent.
On March 20, French chefs will lead a public debate on the "Challenges of sustainable gastronomy in Georgia and France" at the Chveni restaurant, in the presence of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Agency (FAO), local producers, Chef Guram Baghdoshvili and the French Embassy in Georgia. They will discuss the importance of promoting Georgian products and protecting sustainable agriculture.
On March 21, the master class will be conducted at the Georgian Culinary Academy for apprentice Georgian chefs, which will touch upon the traditional local products.
The Georgian restaurants partners of the Embassy of France will propose a dinner "a la francaise" on March 21. The menus will feature various dishes and balance between the food and wine while pairing them. A committee of French chefs selected the Georgian participants according to criteria of quality and coherence of the proposed menu.
Georgian restaurants that offer French menus will be as follows (in Tbilisi): Barbarestan, which will offer a menu dedicated to the post-renaissance cuisine "Eristavi-Bourbon", Chveni, Tartine, The Kitchen; (in Batumi): the Sheraton 360° restaurant.
A press conference presenting the series of events took place on March 18. The event was attended by the representatives of the partner restaurants, Adjara Group, etc.
During the event, it was noted that the food and wine are inseparable and that Georgia provides a perfect opportunity for presenting and introducing traditional cuisine and wine.
HE Pascal Meunier, French Ambassador to Georgia thanked the National Tourism Administration of Georgia as well as the companies Adjara Group, Badagoni and Lukasi for their exceptional support to the event Gout de France 2019.
