What is in a name? In a FB food group, someone had posted a picture of this bread. The picture was instagram worthy but what caught my attention was the name. It was Adjaruli Khachapuri. It screamed indian but the picture did not. If I did not see the picture, I would think it was a poori of some sorts, khacha in hindi means raw or uncooked- khacha aam- raw mango. What would you think the name means?

I decided that I had to make it for dinner! The challenge was my husband does not eat eggs and I am lactose intolerant. So my husband got his without the egg though the crucial part of the dish is the egg. He said his was a bit dry without the egg. In mine, since I can tolerate goat cheese, I added some goat cheese. The boys got it the way it was supposed to be made. This was dinner with a salad. It has to be served hot screams every page I checked. Cut off bread from the side and using it as a spoon, mix the egg into the cheese. The bread almost serves as a bowl like a bread bowl for soup but here as a dip.

Since the bread is from Georgia (the most famous from Adjara, a region in Georgia), I found a Georgian walnut salad dressing to go with my salad. I toasted a handful of walnuts with 2 cloves of garlic. Add to food processor with some basil, cilantro, 1 green serrano chilli, olive oil, 2 tbsp water. Pour over some greens, tomatoes and cucumbers and serve.

The ones I made were too big for us. We could only eat half of the bread and saved it for our lunch the next day. The next day, my son added some finely chopped fried mushrooms, some more cheese and an egg and baked it for 5 minutes. We liked it better with the mushrooms.

The next time I would make smaller ones, add some fried mushrooms or spinach towards the end and drizzle some chilli oil. It may not be the original version but I will call it culinary creativity.

Here is a link about the bread with a short video: https://www.georgianjournal.ge/georgian-cuisine/34443-georgian-cheese-boat-adjaruli-khachapuri-new-york-essential-dish.html

I looked up many recipes online, including NYT Cooking and Saveur. I drizzled the bread before serving with a mixture of olive oil, garlic, dill, dried bell peppers and chilli flakes.

Ingredients

For homemade pizza dough:

• 1 3/4 cups bread flour or atta flour (I used atta)
• 3/4 teaspoon active dry yeast
• 3/4 teaspoon granulated sugar
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoon olive oil
• 2/3 cup warm water

For filling:

• 1 cup/ about 100 grams shredded mozzarella (not fresh mozzarella)
• ⅓ cup goat cheese, finely crumbled
• ⅓ cup drained, finely crumbled feta (not low-fat or light)
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted
• 1 tablespoons cold butter for serving
• 1 large egg
• To drizzle: 1 tbsp olive oil, 1 fresh garlic minced or 1/2 tsp garlic powder, 1 tsp chilli flakes, 1/4 tsp dill, 1/4 dried bell peppers- mixed (optional)

Directions

• Preheat oven to 450ºF
• Add yeast, sugar and luke warm water; mix, cover and let it sit for 5 minutes
• In a stand mixer (using a dough hook), or by hand, add yeast mixture to the flour, salt, 1 tbsp olive oil; mix and knead
• Cover and set in a warm place for an hour or more till dough rises to about double
• For the filling: Mix all cheeses. You can add chopped fresh or dry herbs to the cheese. The herbs are optional. Set aside
• Turn out the dough on a floured work surface. divide into two. Cover and let it sit for 10 minutes
• Roll dough into 1/4 inch thick into a 10-12 inch circle
• On one side of the circle, tightly roll the dough about a third of the way toward the center. Before you roll, you can add some cheese so you get a filling of cheese. Repeat on the opposite end, leaving a 2-3 inch wide space between the two rolls. Pinch the two narrow ends of the rolls together and twist twice to seal, making a boat shape; place another quarter of the cheese mixture in the middle, packing down lightly. Do the swith the second one
• Place in oven and let it bake for about 15-18 minutes
• Brush the edges with butter. With a spoon make a well in the centre. Crack an egg carefully (yolk should not break) in the well and put it back in the oven for 3-4 minutes for the egg white to set.
• Remove from oven, add 1/2 tbsp of butter to each
• Drizzle with oil mixture and serve hot
• Using a fork or pulling out a piece of bread, mix the egg and butter into the cheese and use as a dip.