When the lights go out.

Last week during our 3-day stint without electricity, when we had nothing to do at night except cook and sit around a candle with our neighbors, I learned how to make khinkali, i.e. Georgian dumplings.  Khinkali are a greatly lauded food here that are generally only made for special occasions, due to the long and tenuous process of preparation.  I've sampled/learned to make quite a few different versions of this dish in other countries (i.e. pelmeni, vareniki, manti), and each are unique while very similar.  Khinkali are by far the "prettiest" of the dumplings.  Each is folded into a nice little package to hold in all the juices.  When eating them, you should make sure to slurp out all of the juice so as not to waste.  The doughy tops are discarded on a communal plate as a sort of trophy showing how many of these little dumplings have been conquered.  The Russian version of khinkali, pelmeni, are eaten with smetana (sour cream), and while I will forever stand beside my love for smetana, I've decided to do things the Georgian way and skip the smetana (as hard as it may be) in favor of black pepper, which is still pretty yummy.

I say all this to say that while randomly losing electricity on an almost daily basis kind of sucks, the food and fellowship that comes out of sitting around a candle in the kitchen completely removed from technology is pretty amazing.  And that apparently the mastering of this dish means that I am ready to get married (or so says my host sister).