SOME DISHES

Beshbarmak — Perhaps the most typical Kyrgyz dish. The dish is meant to be eaten with the hands, not with a knife and fork! — «Besh» means five, and «barmak», finger. Beshbarmak is served when guests arrive and at almost any festive gathering. This meal consists of noodles, which are mixed with boiled meat cut into tiny pieces and served with a medium spicy sauce. Bouillon is then poured over the mixture.

Shashlyk — or Kebabs — meat cubes on skewers cooked over the embers of burning twigs. Mutton is the meat usually used, but it is possible to find beef, chicken, liver and even pork shashlyk. The meat may simply be freshly sliced or may have been marinated overnight. Be warned, if the meat is mutton, then almost certainly one of the pieces on the skewer will be pure fat … the dripping fat onto the burning embers is thought to enhance the taste). Shashlyk is usually served with a sprinkling of raw onion, vinegar and lepyoshki.

Plov — (really an Uzbek dish) — rice mixed with boiled, or fried meat, onions and carrots (and sometimes other ingredients such as raisins), all cooked in a semi-hemispherical metal bowl called a kazan over a fire.

Laghman — (another Uzbek dish) — flat noodles cooked in a stew of tiny pieces of mutton, potatoes, carrots, onions and white radishes. A Russian version, minus the noodles, called Shorpo, can often be found

Oromo — This is not usually found in restaurants, but you may be served it by a Kyrgyz family. It can be prepared with meat, or as a vegetarian dish. Potatoes, onions and carrots are shredded and spread onto a mat of rolled out pastry, which is then rolled into a roulette and steamed in a special pan called a kazgun (In Kyrgyz «oromo» means «roulette»).

Ashlan-foo — a spicy dish made with cold noodles, jelly, vinegar and eggs.

Blini — (a Russian dish), pancakes, rolled and filled with meat, tvorak (a sort of cottage cheese), or jam.

Piroshki — flat dough filled with meat, potatoes, cabbage or sometimes nothing at all — sold by street sellers.

Manti — steamed dumplings filled with shredded meat (or sometimes pumpkins), usually eaten with the fingers. A word of warning — watch out for the hot, liquid fat that can come squirting out from them. Also, sometimes the meat can be fatty, or gristle.

Pelmeni — a from of Russian ravioli which can be served in a bouillon (or broth) or without, and usually smetana (sour cream).

Samsa — Samsi (in the plural) are baked meat dumplings often cooked in a tandoor (clay oven). Once again, be warned of the heat and fatty juice that squirts out when you bite into one.