Dish · Nationwide
Plov (osh)
The centrepiece of any Uzbek meal: meat, onions and yellow carrots are cooked into a rich base in a kazan, then rice is steamed on top. UNESCO-listed since 2016.
Dish · Nationwide
Chuchvara
Small boiled Uzbek dumplings, served in broth, with yoghurt or fried until crisp.
Photo: Ji-Elle · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Small but laborious
Chuchvara are manti’s little siblings. Thin dough is cut into small squares, filled with minced meat and onion, and the corners are joined into a tiny ‘ear’. Russian reference works note that Uzbek cooks use two or three parts onion to one part meat in such fillings, which is why chuchvara are so juicy.
A single bowl takes dozens of them, so they are usually made by the whole family or with neighbours, and a batch is frozen for later.
How they are eaten
Chuchvara are boiled in salted water or meat broth. In winter they are loved in broth; they are also served without it, with qatiq yoghurt, herbs and black pepper, or fried in oil after boiling. Teahouses and canteens serve them all year round.
Sources (2)
Dish · Tashkent (city), Tashkent Region
Tashkent plov
The capital’s style of plov: everything is fried first and the rice is mixed into the base; wedding plov adds kazy sausage, chickpeas, raisins and sometimes quail eggs.
Dish · Samarkand
Samarkand plov
A layered plov in which nothing is stirred: the rice stays pale, and the carrots and meat are served on top of it.
Dish · Bukhara
Bukhara plov and oshi sofi
Bukhara’s own plovs: oshi sofi, made with separately boiled and drained rice, and plov cooked with mung beans.
Dish · Fergana, Andijan +1
Fergana plov
The dark plov of the Fergana Valley: a bone, meat, onions and carrots are fried long and hard until the zirvak turns deep brown.
Dish · Khorezm
Khorezm plov
Khorezm’s plov tradition, including suzma palov, in which the rice is boiled separately and drained before it meets the zirvak.
Dish · Nationwide
Samsa
Flaky pastries baked on the inner wall of a tandoor, filled with hand-chopped lamb, tail fat and onion — or wild greens in spring and pumpkin in autumn.
Dish · Jizzakh
Jizzakh samsa
Jizzakh’s culinary calling card: a large dome-shaped samsa made from three layers of dough, packed with lamb and tail fat and dipped in sunflower oil.
Dish · Nationwide
Kabob (shashlik)
Skewered meat grilled over embers — lamb, beef, meat with tail fat, liver, minced qiyma (lula) kabob — served with onion, vinegar and hot bread.
Dish · Bukhara
Gijduvan kebab
The famous minced-meat kebab of Gijduvan in Bukhara Region: the meat is minced twice, frozen, chopped and pressed onto skewers.