Armenia: Food and the National Dish

A very old table

Armenia sits in the South Caucasus with a food culture that draws on some of the oldest agricultural traditions anywhere. The world's earliest known winery, dated to about 4100 BCE, was excavated in the Areni-1 cave in southern Armenia, and the apricot's scientific name, Prunus armeniaca, refers to Armenia, reflecting an old European belief that the fruit came from there, though it was first domesticated in Central Asia and China. Wheat, grapes, walnuts, pomegranates and a huge range of fresh herbs — eaten as a course in their own right rather than only as garnish — form the backbone of the cooking, with lamb, pork and beef providing most of the protein.

The national dish: khorovats

Khorovats, often regarded as the national dish, is Armenian barbecue: chunks of meat, most classically pork but also lamb, beef or chicken, threaded onto long skewers and grilled slowly over the embers of a wood fire, usually alongside skewers of tomato, eggplant and green pepper.

It is the dish of every family gathering, wedding and holiday, cooked outdoors by whoever is trusted with the fire, and it has travelled with the Armenian diaspora wherever it has settled. Dolma, stuffed grape leaves or vegetables, is the other dish with a real claim to being Armenia's signature food, and many households would say a table isn't properly laid without either one.

What defines Armenian cooking

Fresh herbs are eaten more like a vegetable than a seasoning here: a plate of tarragon, basil, mint, coriander and watercress often sits on the table simply to be eaten by hand alongside everything else, as a course in its own right. Dairy is soured rather than sweet — matsun, a thick yoghurt, is eaten plain, cooked with wheat and herbs into the soup spas, or made into a salted drink. Dried and cured meat is a speciality in its own right: basturma, air-dried beef coated in a paste of fenugreek (chaman), cumin, garlic and paprika, and sujukh, a similar cured beef sausage, are both sliced thin and served as a starter.

History on the table

Armenia's position between Persia, the Ottoman world and the wider Caucasus shows up as shared dishes and shared disputes over their origin: versions of khorovats, dolma and khash are eaten, under different names, from Georgia to Turkey to Iran. The Armenian Apostolic Church added its own structure — extended fasting periods through the year produced full meat-and-dairy versions of many dishes alongside "fasting" versions made with oil, nuts and vegetables only, and both are still cooked today. The Armenian Genocide of 1915 scattered a large diaspora across the world, and the cuisine travelled with it; harissa — a wheat-and-meat porridge simmered for hours into a thick paste, traditionally served at Easter — is also remembered for sustaining the Armenians of Musa Dagh (Musa Ler) during their resistance of 1915.

Dishes to know

Five to recognise on any Armenian table (regional specialities are covered on the region pages):

• Dolma — grape leaves or vegetables (peppers, tomatoes, cabbage) stuffed

with rice, herbs and often minced meat; a "fasting" version made without meat is common during Lent.

• Khash — a wintertime soup of boiled cow or sheep trotters and tripe, eaten

for breakfast with garlic and lavash, traditionally alongside vodka in an occasion as social as it is culinary.

• Lavash — a large, thin bread slapped onto the inside wall of a

clay pit oven, the tonir, and peeled off blistered. Lavash was added to UNESCO's intangible cultural heritage list in 2014 and is used to wrap food as much as it is eaten alongside it.

• Harissa — cracked wheat and chicken or lamb cooked down for hours into a

thick, savoury porridge, traditionally eaten at Easter and often called a national dish.

• Ghapama — a whole pumpkin stuffed with rice, butter, dried fruit, honey

and nuts and baked, a festive autumn dish also served at Christmas and New Year.

A regional specialty worth knowing

Zhingyalov hats is one of the clearest examples of how specific Armenian regional food can get: a flatbread filled with ten to twenty kinds of finely chopped, oiled greens and herbs, sealed and cooked on a griddle. It is a traditional dish of Armenians from Artsakh (Karabakh) and Syunik, long a staple in times of scarcity, and shows how much the cuisine still varies from one Armenian region — and one Armenian community — to the next.

Wine, brandy and the toast

Given the age of Armenian winemaking, it is fitting that wine, especially from the Areni region, has seen a real revival in recent years. Armenian brandy, long marketed in the former Soviet Union as Armenian cognac and led by the Ararat label, has a reputation of its own — an undocumented story holds that Winston Churchill had cases sent to him every year after Yalta. Tan, a salted yoghurt drink, and strong, unfiltered coffee are the everyday counterparts. Long meals often come with a series of toasts, to family and to guests, in a tradition close in spirit to neighbouring Georgia's.

Eating as a traveller

Vegetarians can rely on dolma's fasting version, the herb plate, cheese, and the many oil-based vegetable dishes developed for the Church's fasting calendar, though khorovats itself is built around meat. Tap water in Yerevan is generally considered safe. Khash is a strong, particular experience best tried with locals rather than alone — it is eaten early, in quantity, and treated as much as a social ritual as a meal.

What to take from the table

Armenian food centres on fire, bread and hospitality — a khorovats grill going outside, lavash coming warm off the tonir wall, and a table that keeps filling up long after it seems finished.