Nazuki: Georgia's Sweet Spiced Bread You'll Smell Before You See

If you've ever driven between Tbilisi and Kutaisi, you know the moment. Somewhere around the small town of Surami, the highway is lined with wooden huts — dozens of them, one after another, all selling the same thing: glossy, dark-golden loaves of sweet bread studded with raisins and fragrant with cinnamon and cloves. This is nazuki, and those roadside stands have been selling it around the clock for decades. Drivers stop, buy a few loaves, tear off a piece while it's still warm, and the car smells incredible for the next hundred kilometers. It's the road trip bread of Georgia, and once you've had a fresh one straight from a tone oven, you'll understand why nobody drives past Surami without stopping.

What Is Nazuki?

Nazuki is an enriched sweet bread — loaded with butter, eggs, sugar, and warm spices, with raisins folded through the dough. If you've had Portuguese sweet bread, Italian panettone, or Eastern European babka, you're in the neighborhood. But nazuki has its own character: less sweet than most Western sweet breads, heavier on the spice (cinnamon and cloves are the backbone), and with that distinctive glossy, almost lacquered egg-washed crust that catches the light like polished wood.

The texture falls somewhere between brioche and challah. The crumb is soft and slightly pull-apart, not dense or cakey. A good nazuki has enough structure to tear cleanly but enough richness to melt in your mouth. The raisins provide little bursts of sweetness that contrast with the warm spice, and the crust — when fresh — has a thin crackle before yielding to the soft interior.

It's not a dessert, exactly. Georgians eat it with tea, with coffee, as a road snack, as a breakfast bread, or just whenever it's around. It doesn't need butter or jam — it's already rich enough on its own. Though nobody will judge you for spreading some fresh honey on a warm slice.

The Surami Story

You can buy nazuki in bakeries across Georgia, but Surami owns it. This small town in the Shida Kartli region sits on the main highway between Tbilisi and western Georgia, and for a roughly 3-kilometer stretch, the road is flanked by wooden huts — over 50 of them — each one selling fresh nazuki. Some operate around the clock. The local name for this stretch is simply "Nazukebi" — the plural of nazuki. That's how central this bread is to the town's identity.

The tradition started during the economic collapse of the 1990s, when Georgian families were desperate for income after the Soviet Union fell apart. People in Surami built small tone ovens and started baking nazuki to sell to passing drivers. What started as survival became a regional economy. Today, nazuki is Surami's main industry, and the roadside stands are a genuine landmark — every Georgian knows them.

The tone oven makes a real difference. These are the same cylindrical clay ovens used to bake shotis puri — the dough is slapped onto the scorching inner walls and bakes in intense, radiant heat. A tone oven hits temperatures that a home oven can't touch, which gives the crust its particular depth of color and the interior an almost steamed quality. The home oven version is still excellent, but if you ever get the chance to eat one fresh from a tone — take it.

History and Cultural Meaning

The word "nazuki" comes from Persian and translates roughly to "exquisite" or "delicate" — which tells you something about how Georgians regard this bread. Ethnographer Tedo Sakhokia wrote that it symbolizes prosperity, softness, and delicacy. It's not just food; it's a cultural marker.

Nazuki has been part of Georgian cuisine for centuries, particularly in the Kartli, Kakheti, and Meskheti regions. It traditionally serves as a festive bread — the Georgian equivalent of what paskha (Easter bread) is in Russian Orthodox tradition. In Kartli, nazuki IS the Easter bread, baked specifically for the holiday table and given as gifts to neighbors and family. But unlike many festival breads around the world that only appear once a year, nazuki broke free of its seasonal role. The Surami roadside industry made it an everyday bread, available year-round, and now it's as likely to be a Tuesday afternoon snack as an Easter centerpiece.

Nazuki vs. Other Georgian Breads

Georgia has an absurdly rich bread tradition — from the canoe-shaped Adjarian khachapuri to the cornbread mchadi of western Georgia. Nazuki occupies a unique niche as the only widely known Georgian sweet bread. Here's how it fits in:

Ingredients

Nazuki uses ingredients you likely already have. The only thing that might require a trip to the store is enough raisins. Here's the full breakdown for 6 loaves:

Understanding the Spices

The cinnamon-clove combination is what makes nazuki smell the way it does — warm, slightly exotic, a little bit like Christmas in countries that use those spices for holiday baking. But in Georgia, this isn't a holiday flavor. It's just what nazuki tastes like, year-round.

Cinnamon is the lead player. It's doing most of the aromatic heavy lifting. If you're using good-quality cinnamon (Ceylon or Vietnamese), you'll get a more complex, slightly floral note. Cheaper cassia cinnamon works fine — it's actually what most Georgian bakers use — and gives a stronger, more straightforward cinnamon punch.

Cloves are the supporting actor that makes everything interesting. They add a warm, slightly numbing quality that deepens the flavor. But cloves are aggressive — use too much and your bread will taste like a dentist's office. Start with half a teaspoon and taste-test after mixing the dough. You can always add more; you can't take it out.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Step 1: Activate the Yeast

Warm the milk to about 38°C — a few degrees above body temperature. It should feel comfortably warm on the inside of your wrist, not hot. Pour it into a bowl, crumble in the fresh yeast (or sprinkle the dry yeast), and let it sit for 5 minutes. You're looking for the surface to get foamy and bubbly. If nothing happens after 10 minutes, your yeast is dead — start over with fresh yeast.

Step 2: Mix the Wet Ingredients

In a large bowl, combine the melted butter, sugar, salt, 2 beaten eggs, oil, cinnamon, cloves, and vanilla. Whisk until smooth. Pour in the activated yeast-milk mixture and stir everything together. The mixture will be fragrant and look like spiced custard — that's right.

Step 3: Build the Dough

Add the flour in three batches, stirring with a wooden spoon until it gets too thick to stir. Turn the shaggy mass out onto a floured surface and knead by hand for 8–10 minutes. The dough will be wetter and stickier than regular bread dough because of all the butter and eggs — that's normal. Resist adding too much extra flour. Use a light coating of oil on your hands instead.

You're done kneading when the dough is smooth, elastic, and springs back slowly when poked. It should feel like a baby's cheek — soft and slightly tacky but not sticking to your fingers.

Step 4: Add the Raisins

Flatten the dough into a rough rectangle, scatter the raisins over it, then fold and gently knead until they're evenly distributed — about 1–2 minutes. Some raisins will poke through the surface, and a few will try to escape. That's fine. They'll settle during rising.

Step 5: First Rise

Shape the dough into a ball, rub a thin film of oil over it, place it in a clean bowl, and cover with a damp kitchen towel or plastic wrap. Put it somewhere warm — near a window in summer, on top of the fridge, or in an oven with just the light on. Let it rise for 1.5–2 hours until it has doubled in size.

Step 6: Shape

Punch down the risen dough to release the gas. Divide it into 6 equal pieces — each should weigh roughly 220–240g. Shape each piece into a flattened oval, about 15cm long, 8cm wide, and 2–3cm thick at the center. Traditional Surami nazuki are elongated half-moons — think of a flattened bean shape, tapered at both ends. Some bakers score a few shallow lines across the top for decoration, but this is optional.

Place the shaped loaves on baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Leave at least 5cm between them — they'll expand during the second rise and baking.

Step 7: Second Rise

Cover the shaped loaves with a towel and let them rise for 30–45 minutes. They should puff up noticeably — maybe 50% larger — but shouldn't double. While they rise, preheat your oven to 200°C (390°F). Put the rack in the middle position.

Step 8: Glaze and Bake

Beat the remaining egg yolk with 1 tablespoon of milk and a tiny pinch of salt (the salt helps the wash go on smoothly). Brush generously over each loaf. Don't be shy — this is what creates nazuki's signature glossy, chestnut-brown crust. For extra shine, do two coats, letting the first one set for a minute before applying the second.

Bake for 25–30 minutes. You're looking for a deep golden brown — the color of dark honey or well-stained oak. Not pale yellow, not burned. If the tops are browning faster than the sides, tent loosely with foil for the last 5–10 minutes. The loaves are done when they sound hollow when tapped on the bottom.

Step 9: Cool (If You Can)

Transfer to a wire rack and let cool for at least 10 minutes. The interior needs a few minutes to set, and the crust develops its final texture during cooling. But honestly? Tearing into a warm nazuki straight from the oven is half the experience. In Surami, nobody waits.

Visual Doneness Cues

Tone Oven vs. Home Oven

Let's be honest: a home oven will never replicate a tone oven perfectly. The tone hits 350–400°C+ and cooks from radiant heat on the clay walls, giving the bread a char pattern and a slightly smoky, steamed quality that convection heat can't match. But the good news is that nazuki is more forgiving than shotis puri in this regard. Since it's an enriched dough (butter, eggs, sugar), the browning and crust development happen readily even at lower temperatures.

Common Mistakes

Variations

Serving and Pairing

Nazuki doesn't need accompaniment — it's complete on its own. But if you want to build a spread around it, here's what works:

Storage and Reheating

Frequently Asked Questions