Central Asian cuisine

Culinary traditions of Central Asia

Central Asian cuisine has been influenced by Persian, Indian, Arab, Turkish, Chinese, Mongol, African and Russian cultures, as well as the culinary traditions of other varied nomadic and sedentary civilizations. Contributing to the culinary diversity were the migrations of Uyghur, Slav, Korean, Tatar, Dungan and German people to the region.

Nomadic peoples of the Eurasian steppe had simple subsistence diets based primarily on dairy products, and to a lesser extent game and plant based foods. Archaeobotanical evidence has shown that crop diffusion was ongoing across the mountain valleys and oasis towns of Central Asia as early as the 3rd millennium BC. The earliest evidence of domesticated grains bring used by nomadic herders (2800 to 2300 BC) has been found at the Tasbas and Begash sites of the Kazakh highland steppe. Triticum turgidum and panicum miliaceum found at highland campsites in Central Eurasia represent the first known transmission of these domesticated grains from China and the region south of the Syr Darya river into Central Eurasia. Central Asian cooking techniques were influenced by the lack of water. Poplar trees, saxaul and animal dung were the primary fuel sources used in tandyr ovens, designed to maximize the heat gained from the limited supply of fuel, where flatbread, samsa and meats were cooked. Soups, stews and steamed dumplings were cooked in single cauldron pots. Some common ingredients and flavors can be found in the varied cuisines of region. These include generous use of tail fat from sheep and onion, hot peppers, black pepper, cumin, sesame seed, nigella, basil, cilantro, parsley, mint and dill. These are used in all sorts of dishes including soups, salads and pilafs. Less common are cinnamon and saffron.

Halva is made from sesame seeds, with flour, sugar, milk and nuts. The local version of baklava is called paklama. For Eid celebrations, deep fried dough balls drenched in honey syrup called çäkçäk are piled into mounds, along with sugar dusted dough spirals called urama. Kyrgyz boorsog is a similar deep fried dough dish, called bogursak in Turkmenistan, and baursaq in Kazakhstan. From Turkic cuisine came the flatbreads yufka and çörek, katmer pastry and a noodle dish called tutmaç. Its wild ancestors probably originated in Persia (regions of which are now Iran and Afghanistan).