# 3 Turkmen pilaf - Plov

The first two recipes I made, Mosterdsoep and the Tortilla Española, were relatively easy for me because I have lived in both countries of origin. Therefore I decided to challenge myself this time and pick a recipe from a country with a cuisine of which I knew absolutely nothing: Turkmenistan! 

Turkmenistan is a country in central Asia and used to be part of the Soviet Union. Some research on the Internet told me that Turkmen food is based on traditional dishes from their former nomadic
lifestyle. Since traveling around doesn't leave time for cultivating crops, they don't eat a lot of vegetables but they do eat a lot of meat dairy and bread. Turkmen love bread even more then us dutch people. There are all kinds of superstition related to turkmen bread and bread making. Culturally bread has a symbolic value and it is perceived as very impolite to turn it upside down or mistreat it.

This would not be ok in Turkmenistan

The national dish is plov, a Turkmen version of pilaf. There wasn't a lot of variety between different plov recipes I found. All of them used some kind of meat or chicken, a ridiculous amount of oil, onions, carrots, rice and some of them also garlic. For my recipe I combined two recipes from turkmen kitchen and  asia recipe. I chose to use chicken and went for organic chicken breast, it turned out to be a bad idea because it became quite dry, next time I would prefer drumsticks or lamb/beef. The basmati rice worked really well, as did the garlic. For a traditional Turkmen plov you should use cottonseed oil, but since that is unavailable over here I just went for sunflower oil. Don't use olive oil that will overrule the taste.

Plov  

serves 2

250 gr / 0.5 lb meat [chicken(drumsticks)/lamb/beef]

150 gr / 2 medium carrots

1 medium onion

1/2 cup vegetable or sunflower oil [traditionally this is cottonseed oil]

5 cloves of garlic

1.5 cup / 375 ml water

2 cups / 250 gr basmati rice

1 1/4 teaspoon salt

Pepper

Cut the meat into bite-size peaces (leave this out if you use chicken drumsticks)

Peel and cut the carrots in a match like shape (3 inch - 1/8 inch or 7cm - 30 mm). [this step might take a while]

cut the onion into thin half rings

Heat the oil on a medium heat.
[Yes the amount is ridiculous but this is what you'll need!]

 

Add the chicken and garlic. Turkmen sometimes put garlic in with skin and all [take them out before you serve].

Once the meat is golden brown, add the onion.




  

Add the carrots and fry until they are soft.

Add water and salt and let it cook for 5 minutes.

Now add your rice on top.
[leave it on top, don't mix it untill the end]

Cover your pan and boil for 30 - 45 minutes until the rice is done and the moist has been absorbed.








Serve your plov, I garnished with some green onion.

Plov is delicious yet heavy so it is nice to serve a green salad next to it!

Isdäniz acyk bolsun!





ps. If reading this gave you an appetite for more turkmen food, check this amazing blog for recipes!
for more information on the turkmen cuisine you can click here and here.