Sauces

Grilled meats and fish are rarely served plain, since they make such excellent foils for sauce. Georgian sauces offer tremendous variety. Most are prepared from the same fruits, vegetables, and nuts that appear in various guises in other dishes. Plums, blackberries, blackthorn, grapes, pomegranates, tomatoes, and cornelian cherries are all pureed for sauce, as are cilantro, beets, garlic, and spinach. Georgian sauces are characteristically tart; some are piquant as well. An interesting feature of the Georgian sauce repertoire is that the same basic dressing adorns vastly different foods. Thus the nut sauce satsivi is served with meat, poultry, fish, and vegetables alike. Some sauces are so delicious in and of themselves that a common expression goes, “With a Georgian sauce you can swallow nails!” These sauces are rich enough to be served alone, accompanied only by a slice of bread for mopping.