Uzbek Cuisine

The fruit in Uzbekistan is very fresh, better than what you can buy at most American grocery stores. One way Uzbeks get their fresh fruit is by growing fruit trees and vines around their houses. Not only so they get fresh fruit, it looks beautiful and keeps the houses cool in the summer.

When I asked how to cook Uzbek food, mastava was the first dish I was taught how to cook. It is simple and tasty.

3 Tablespoons vegetable oil
1 pound beef cut into 1/4 inch cubes (it just tastes better than using ground beef)
1 small onion chopped
1 large carrot peeled and diced
1 large potato peeled and diced
1 stalk of celery chopped
3 tablespoons of tomato paste
6 cups of water
salt and pepper
3/4 cup rice
sour cream

Heat oil until very hot. Fry onion add tomato paste and fry. Add beef and fry until browned. Add carrot and celery. Reduce heat to medium and stir constantly until the vegetables are soft.

Pour in the water. Raise the heat until the water boils. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add potato and rice.

Lower heat and cover, simmer for 20 minutes. Taste for seasoning. Serve in a bowl and put some sour cream in it.

Easy, cheap, and tasty. The best introduction to Uzbek cooking.

Tovuk means chicken in Uzbek and this is a very easy recipe for Chicken Plov. The recipe comes from The Art of Uzbek Cooking by Lynn Visson.

1 pound chicken, or two frying chickens cut into serving pieces
6 tablespoons vegetable oil
3 medium onions thinly sliced
6 carrots peeled and cut into thin strips
5 cups of water
salt and pepper
2 cups rice

Dry chicken (or you will get burned when the oil pops)

ZIRVAK

In a heavy pot like a dutch oven or kazan, heat oil and brown chicken pieces on all sides.

Add onion and saute until golden brown.

Add carrots and cook for five minutes.

Add 3 cups of water, salt and pepper to taste, raise heat to boil.

Lower heat to simmer. Cover and simmer until chicken and carrots are tender. You can add water to keep the zirvak from burning.

PART 2

While cooking the zirvak, soak rice in salted water for 30 minutes.

When the zirvak is ready, place the rice on top of the chicken and CAREFULLY pour in the remaining water. DO NOT MIX RICE AND CHICKEN.

Put heat on high. Bring to a boil. REduce heat a little to prevent burning and watch it until the water has evaporated.

Push the rice towards the center. Then poke holes in several places with the handle of a wooden spoon.

Cook and cover over low heat until rice is done and all the water has evaporated. (remember that is your goal) Do not allow the plov to burn.

Serve rice on a plate and put the chicken on top.

I tried this recipe and thought that it called for too much water. I would put maybe 2 cups of water in the zirvak and a cup and a half on top of the rice. Otherwise you get slimey plov.

The most popular Uzbek dish is plov or osh. This is also the dish Americans trying to cook Uzbek food usually screw up. That is because it has a certain technique to it that must be practiced and mastered. Most Americans also do not have the fortune of having a native Uzbek or other Central Asian to show them the technique. Once mastered, plov is a very delicious and satisfying dish that the entire family, including those meat and potatoes only relatives, can enjoy.

INGREDIENTS: The ingredients which must be in osh or plov are oil, onion, carrot, and rice.
Meat is usually in osh but you can substitute kasi (horse sausage), golubtsi (stuffed grape leaves), or even eggs for the meat which is usually meat or mutton. Chicken plov is also very delicious.

There are other variations of plov which use peas, whole garlic, quince or tart apple, raisins, turnip, dried apricot, and potato.

Plov used to be cooked with fat usually from the sheep tail. Nowadays people use sesame oil, cotton oil, or good ol’ vegetable oil. Olive oil has too strong of a flavor and is not recommended.

You can also use either regular carrots or yellow carrots especially in Samarqand and Khorazm plov.

TECHNIQUE: There are two steps in making plov. The first is called zirvak. In this step you brown the onion, carrot, and meat in lots of oil in a heavy pot like a kazan. After browning then you add water and spices. Only use half of the salt. Commonly used spices include caraway seeds, cumin, pepper, and red pepper pods. You can also use anise and barberries. For American kitchens, salt and pepper will work just fine. You cook the zirvak until the vegetables are cooked well.

The second step is the tricky step. This is this rice step. First you must soak the rice in salted water for 30 minutes. This is very important. After the zirvak is done, place the rice in a flat layer, and pour over hot water. Add salt and bring to boil. Keep the heat on high until all of the water evaporates. Then gather the rice (DO NOT MIX THE RICE WITH THE ZIRVAK!!) to the middle of the pot. (use a kazan or heavy pot if you have one.) Pierce holes in the rice all the way to the bottom with a spoon and lower the heat. Cover rice with a plate and then put the pot cover on. SIMMER. You should hear a “goop goop” sound as the moisture is mixed into the rice. Keep a close eye on it or it will burn. The goal is to get ALL of the fluid whether in water of zirvak evaporated and cooked into the rice. NUMBER ONE RULE– Do not mix the rice and the zirvak.

When serving, carefully put the rice on the bottom of the plate. Then top with the zirvak.

VARIATIONS: There are different variations of plov depending on where you are in Uzbekistan. The most common plov is Fergana Plov. There is also Samarqand plov used with yellow carrots so that the rice is still white. In the Burkhorocha method, the rice, meat and vegetables are cooked separately. If you screw up the rice, mix it ith the zirvak and then you make a different dish called Shavla or Shoola. After cooking the Shavla by mixing the rice and the meat and vegetable mixture, fry some onion and top the shavla with them along with fresh cilantro and parsley.

SIDE DISHES: Fresh greens like parsley, coriander (cilantro), and scallions are great to serve with plov. For an easy salad, chop up some onion and tomato. Chopped up tomato tastes great with plov. The best of all is to serve bread. Uzbek bread called non is the best. If you can’t get non pita or any other flat bread goes fine. My husband sometimes pours V8 juice on his plov. For dessert eat some grapes or raisins (kishmish) and drink tea or milk.

Please share your favorite plov recipe.

1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 medium onion finely chopped
1 carrot diced
1 potato cubed
2 large tomatoes coarsely chopped
(or use can of crushed tomatoes)
1 tsp cumin seeds
1/2 tsp paprika
salt and pepper
4 1/2 cups chicken stock or water
3/4 cup mung beans soaked overnight
(you can cheat with split green peas)
1 cup rice
2 tablespoons coriander (preferably chopped, fresh cilantro)

Heat oil, saute onions until they turn GOLDEN (very important)
Add carrots and potato until they start to BROWN
Mix tomatoes, cumin, paprika, salt and pepper to taste
Add 1 1/2 cups boiling stock or water and boil five minutes
Stir in mung beans
Reduce heat and cover for about 40 minutes until beans are soft
Place remaining 3 cups of water or stock in another pot and stir in rice. Boil rice for two minutes reduce heat to low, cover pot, and cook for 20 minutes until liquid is absorbed and rice is tender. (I will test out just cooking it in a rice cooker and see if that is just as good)

Stir in rice into vegetable mixture, spinkle with coriander or cilantro and serve.

Adapted from The Art of Uzbek Cooking by Lynn Visson

VERY Ochen Vkusno!!

This picture illustrates the two different shapes of samsa. It is more common to shape the samsa into a triangle. It is faster and easier to shape it into a circle around the filling, and roll under. Make sure to pinch the ends and cover with egg yolk so that it won’t open.

OCHEN VKUSNA!!

1 pound dried chickpeas, soaked in water overnight (or use canned chickpeas)
2 medium onions coarsely chopped
2 medium carrots coarsely chopped
salt
pepper
1 tsp cumin seeds
2 teaspoons red wine vinegar

Drain chickpeas well, place in pot with onions and carrots.
Pour in water to cover the vegetables by 2 inches
Add salt to taste. My husband’s family uses a lot of salt. I like it more bland and I add seasoned salt or cajun spice instead.
Reduce heat, cover and cook on low for 50 minutes or until chickpeas are soft.
Drain well. Taste for seasoning and add salt or cayenne as needed. (I add more cayenne or use cajun spice.)
You can add scallions just before serving.

DOUGH
4 cups flour
pinch salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 3/4 cups water
1 egg well beaten, plus egg yolk

FILLING
1 lb beef chopped into pea sized pieces
2 large onions chopped real thin
salt
pepper
2 teaspoons butter
1 potato chopped

Mix flour, salt, and baking powder in large bowl

Beat water with egg and add to dry ingredients

Work the dough until it can be handled easily, adding water in necessary

Form the dough into a ball and set aside in a bowl for one hour

In a large bowl mix meat, onions, salt, pepper, and mix well with hands

Roll dough on a floured board to 1/4 in thickness. I use a combination of a rolling pin and that long stick called an o’qlow. I guess you can use a rolling pin. Then you melt butter or margarine and spread it on the dough. (it might be a good idea to split the dough into two) Then you roll the dough up and wrap it and stick into the freezer for 15 minutes. You take it out of the freezer then slice the roll into 2 inch pieces. Then you flatten the pieces and roll them into 4 in circles. Put 2 tablespoons of filling into each circle and wrap it either in a triangle shape or a circle.

Beat an egg yolk and sread on each samsa.

Put the samsas in a GREASED baking sheet and bake 40 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

I tried this recipe and it was a delicious success. The technique I used to make samsa was taught to me by my mother-in-law who is from Tashkent. Samsa is my favorite Uzbek food to make. It is difficult, but very delicious.

Uzbek Spaghetti

October 29th, 2006 by Ambar