Uzbek Cuisine

Uzbek cuisine is the hearty, richly flavoured food of the Silk Road, shaped by nomadic, Persian and Turkic traditions and built around rice, meat, bread and vegetables. Its national dish, cooked with great pride and ceremony, is plov, or osh, a fragrant one-pot dish of rice, lamb, carrots and onions slow-cooked in a huge cauldron. Alongside come the round tandoor-baked bread non, grilled shashlik kebabs, hearty soups, the dumplings manti and samsa, and endless bowls of green tea in the shady chaikhana teahouse.

What you actually see

• Plov (osh) - the national dish of rice, lamb and carrots.
• Non bread - the round, decorated tandoor-baked bread.
• Shashlik and samsa - the grilled kebabs and baked pastries.
• The chaikhana - the traditional teahouse and its green tea.

When to go

Year-round; plov is traditionally eaten at lunch and central to celebrations, and watching it cooked in a giant cauldron at a plov centre is a spectacle. The bazaars and chaikhana teahouses are the atmospheric places to eat and drink tea.

Honest expectations

Uzbek food is very hearty, meat-and-rice-heavy and rich, so it can feel repetitive over a long trip and is a challenge for vegetarians, though the bread, salads, samsa and dairy help. The famous plov is delicious but oily. Green tea, not water, accompanies meals. The bazaars and teahouses are wonderful, sociable places to eat, and the hospitality is warm and generous.

Nearby

Every region has its own style of plov; the bazaars everywhere sell fresh non and fruit.