Restaurants aren’t hard to come by in Tbilisi, but it is harder to find places that feel like eating in your grandmother’s living room. Walls lined with family photographs fading from color to black and white, an eclectic collection of paintings, a whole window dedicated to religious icons, and a menu that can change on a whim. This is Nikolozi, a tiny restaurant in Sololaki run by Dodo Ilashvili, a singular powerhouse who creates the food and the feeling all herself.
There’s no sign outside, just a small board with hours written in a variety of languages. An ivy-covered archway lit by a single lamp leads down a few steps to a door which radiates a dim glow when the restaurant is open. If you’ve found the right leafy arch and are bold enough to walk down and open the door, you’ll find yourself in the single room that is Nikolozi. “This is our house and we live on the second story. We’ve lived here a long time – fifty years!” says Dodo. “I opened the restaurant in 2017,” she continues. “We started with a tailor shop, but then everyone said that I cooked so well that we opened the restaurant instead.” Clearly everyone was right, as the restaurant is often packed with people. “Our high season starts in the spring and lasts until November,” says Dodo. “It gets very busy and we can barely accept any more customers.”
It’s no wonder Nikolozi feels a bit like a relative’s living room. When she transitioned from sewing to stewing, Dodo recalls, “I did all of the redecoration. The decoration is a mix of things that we have in the house and things that I collected. My favorite piece of art is the one with the woman and child. I love it. It was painted by a famous Georgian artist, but when I bought it a long time ago, he was still very poor and unknown.” That artist is Lado Kevdozadze, and his painting takes up a column on the right as you enter the restaurant. Across the room from the Kevdozadze, a wall and shelf are lined with photographs. Talking us through the images, Dodo points out her son, her grandson, her dogs and a photo of her and her husband, as well as her grandfather and grandmother. She tells us, “We have a lot of photographs of our family. I love all of them.” The photographs also give a clue to the name of the restaurant. “I called it Nikolozi because that is the name of my grandson.”
Dodo is the mastermind behind everything at Nikolozi, from the interior design to every dish on the menu. “We have a lot of special dishes – all of them Georgian and all of them are made by me alone. I cook everything by myself!” she says. “But all of the recipes are traditional Georgian recipes, the classic recipes.” The menu is a handwritten list of what’s available in a range of language options, but if you speak some Georgian or Russian it’s also worth asking about recommendations, as the daily choices can vary. “I change the menu according to what we have available and what I feel like cooking. Sometimes I make khinkali, sometimes I don’t.” explains Dodo, “We have a lot of return customers and I like to have new things to make sure that there is something different for them each time.”
Dodo’s lobiani, in particular, is exceptional – the addition of walnuts to this traditional bean-stuffed bread creates a rich flavor and the light dough is pan-fried to a perfect crisp. The Rachan ham, when it is available, is wonderfully prepared and well worth ordering. The prices are also generously low for Tbilisi – starters like salads and badrijani, eggplant and walnut rolls, cost 10 Georgian lari (GEL) (around US $3.56) while main dishes are 17 GEL. The most expensive item on the menu, ojakhuri, barbecued meat with potatoes, is still only 23 GEL. Even Nikolozi’s house wine is all homemade. “My husband makes the wine and the cognac. Although at the moment he’s busy taking my grandson to football practice so he hasn’t had time,” explains Dodo. The drink prices are also very reasonable; across the range of ten red and white wines, most are either 20 or 30 GEL for a liter. Whatever you choose, it’s worth drinking enough to visit the bathroom. To get there, you climb up a flight of stairs to perch upon a porcelain throne in what feels like a miniature tower.
A visit to Nikolozi carries the familiar feeling of being with family. It’s welcoming and casual; you write out your order on a ticket and can only pay with cash. But most importantly, the food is cooked with the same love as you’d get at home. “I don’t have any favorite dishes,” says Dodo. “I love them all because I cook them from the soul, as I would if I was making them for my son or my husband.”
- July 8, 2024 First Stop
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