Tajikistan - On the Silk Road

Numerous countries in Central Asia have a name that ends in "stan,":

     Afghanistan, Pakistan

    Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan

    Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan

    And Tajikistan

As a generally accepted explanation, the suffix "stan" is an ancient Persian and/or Farsi word meaning country, nation, land, or place of, so, the country name of Afghanistan would then mean "homeland" of the Afghans, or place of the Afghans. (cited from:  https://www.worldatlas.com/aatlas/infopage/stan.htm)

Tajikistan is my food destination. From the same site: Tajikistan In Persian, taj means "crown" and ik means "head," so tajik means "a person wearing a crown on his head." Tajiks were originally Persians.

I never thought much about the Stans. I have eaten Afghani dishes. I am familiar with how Pakistan came to be. There is a lot of news about these two countries over the last 18 years, but I will not digress into politics. So, when I pulled Tajikistan out of the hat, I thought hmmmm, this should be interesting.

The country sits pretty much in the middle of the Stans. Except for the two aforementioned Stans, all were once part of the Soviet Union. The country gained independence in September 1991 when the Soviet Union fell. There is deep history in this part of the world. Tajikistan’s history includes routes on the Silk Road. The famous trade routes between China and Europe.

The bread, Non, is very interesting. Not because the recipe is unique, the ingredients are a common combination in bread making. It’s the bread stamps used to decorate the bread. Yes, bread stamps. Unbeknownst to me, stamping bread has been around since the Egyptians first started making bread. The stamps were used to let customers know who produced the bread or that it was from an official source.

Market Bread

In Tajik tradition, as far as I can tell, the flat bread is stamped for decorative reasons. The stamps are made of walnut wood and have metal pins set in many patterns. I was intrigued. So, I went on the hunt for bread stamps. Uzbekistan has quite a market for bread stamps. The cost is VERY cheap in Uzbekistan markets and fairly spendy on Etsy or Amazon. I kept telling myself that was too much to pay, I didn’t need bread stamps from Uzbekistan. Both Etsy & Amazon orders are shipped from Uzbekistan, I now have the packaging to prove it. I admit, I cannot pass up a kitchen gadget. Plus, this was less expensive that a trip to Uzbekistan. But now it’s on my list.

So now I have a set of three Uzbek bread stamps to make Tajik flat bread pretty. Whatever.

One of Tajikistan’s national dishes is palov. This is a meat and rice dish, think pilaf, prepared with either beef or lamb.

Tajik cuisine is not heavy on vegetables or dessert. I actually could not find a dessert recipe. Doesn’t mean there aren’t any I suppose. Nor were there much in the way of vegetable sides. I found Qurtob to be the most appetizing. It is basically a tomato, onion and cucumber salad. It might have a yogurt/cream sort of cheese underneath or toasted bread mixed in. The dressing iMy tummy doesn’t do well with raw onions so I will need to skip eating the onion.

So, my menu is Non, Beef Plov and Qurtob.

The bread is very similar to making naan or pita. After the dough is flattened dip the bread stamp in oil and press into the dough. A very sharp knife can be used to slash the dough as well as a fork for varied patterns. Recipe inspiration: Yogurt Naan/Non | Global Table Adventure

The preparation of the plov reminded me of chicken and rice. Although the meat and vegetables are cooked first in a broth and then the rice is added. Very tasty and filling.  The salad was fine. The addition of ground coriander to the  olive oil and lemon/vinegar dressing added a nice flavor. So here you have it, a small trip to Tajikistan. Palov recipe: Beef Plov (Beef Rice Pilaf) Recipe (natashaskitchen.com).

I combined a few recipes for the salad. Here's my take:

Tajikistan Salad ‘Qurtob’

2 tablespoon lemon juice

1 tablespoon rice vinegar or cider vinegar

1 teaspoon sugar

¾ teaspoon ground coriander

3 ounces extra virgin olive oil

4 large ripe tomatoes, chopped

½ cucumber, halved lengthwise, seeded and sliced

3 spring onions, thinly sliced

small bunch of coriander leaves, chopped

small bunch of dill, chopped

3 ounces feta, crumbled

To make the dressing, mix the lemon juice, vinegar, sugar and coriander in a bowl. Gradually whisk in the olive oil until well blended, then season with salt.

Put the tomatoes, cucumber and spring onions into a large serving dish and toss with the dressing and herbs. Crumble over the feta. Toss once and serve.

Chicken Shawarma, Ottoman Empire origins?

 

This middle eastern street food is cooked on a revolving spit. It is basically a vertical
rotisserie. 

You can buy one from about $250.00 on up. Up being restaurant grade that is upwards of $2000+.

So grilling is much easier and requires no special equipment except a grill pan for the stove top. Or on the barbecue (gas or charcoal).

There are seemingly millions of recipes for shawarma. Beef, lamb, turkey or chicken are the usual suspects. The spice mix varies from recipe to recipe to recipe. Even within the same protein the variations seem endless. Although, perhaps the difference is more cultural than just variety.

More than one internet source states that shawarma originated from the Ottoman Empire in the 18th or 19th century. The Ottoman empire lasted from the late 13^th century through the early 20^th century (1299-1922).  In Arabic, shawarma means turning. The Greek gyro is related as well as tacos al pastor.

I read the Washington Post most days. They have a great food section. I came across the headline: Take a tour of Middle Eastern cooking with 9 recipes, including shawarma, flatbreads and tahdig

Of course, I clicked through and perused the recipes. The first on the list was chicken shawarma. The headline of this article: Israeli-style chicken shawarma is surprisingly accessible to make at home (A chicken shawarma recipe that makes Israeli-style cooking surprisingly easy - The Washington Post). The Israeli part caught my attention. The recipe is adapted from the book Sababa: Fresh, Sunny Flavors from My Israeli Kitchen.  

I read through the recipe and then compared it to a recipe I have already saved for grilled chicken shawarma (Grilled Chicken Shawarma - Rose Water & Orange Blossoms (maureenabood.com). The author of this site is Lebanese American and the spice list is somewhat different. It includes sumac, allspice and mint plus the usual suspects. I have made it a few times and it’s delicious.

The Post recipe spices include the usual, the different spices being cardamom, paprika, oregano, cinnamon, cloves and ginger. Also, it lists Amba for serving. What the heck is that? More investigation, down the worm hole I go. Amba is a mango pickle condiment. Story has it that Iraqi-Jews introduced the condiment to Israel in the 1950s-1960s. It was adopted by Iraqi-Jews in Bombay I assume while living there. And on to Israel as the Iraqi-Jews moved there. An urban legend from the murky depths of Wikipedia.

Most recipes are saucy. I found a pickle for green mango spears  (https://www.cardamomandtea.com/blog/amba) The author is of Assyrian decent and is not Jewish, so I assume the pickle is not traditional in Israel.

It sounded intriguing. Also, it called for yellow curry powder with an accompanying recipe (Yellow Curry Powder Recipe — Cardamom and Tea).

I have no idea how authentic any of this is. I would like to go to Israel and try the street food out for myself. I have a couple of friends who go there (or went there before the pandemic) often and I am sure could point out the errors of these dishes. But they are very nice people and would be nice in the critique.

So, I marinated the chicken and made the yellow curry.

Pickled up the green mango and red onion. Shredded some cabbage, diced up a tomato & dressed it. I also made a batch of hummus.

Grilled the chicken and had a darn good shawarma. 

I had the flat bread in the freezer, which I made a while back.