The bashkir

Bashkir cuisine, like culture and national traditions, was certainly formed under the influence of the lifestyle of this very original and interesting people. The Bashkirs are a semi-nomadic people who inhabit a fairly vast territory of the Southern Urals. In winter, the Bashkirs lived in villages, and for the summer they moved to settlements called in Bashkir "yeileu. " This, of course, affected the variety of foods consumed and the methods of their preparation.

First of all, it is worth noting such a feature of Bashkir cuisine as a relatively small number of seasonings used in them. The main seasonings are pepper, black and red, and garlic. However, this is fully compensated by the abundance of greens found in the recipes of Bashkir cuisine, namely dill, parsley and spring onions.

Another feature of Bashkir recipes is the presence of meat in the vast majority of them. Bashkirs are very fond of meat and know how to cook it in many different ways. People who are not familiar with the peculiarities of Bashkir cuisine can be greatly surprised by the amount of meat that local residents can eat. Bashkirs are especially fond of meat combined with onions and salt.

The main type of meat used in dishes of Bashkir cuisine is horse meat. The traditional meal of the Bashkirs is horse meat with thick pieces of lard, which is washed down with broth with sour smoke. Kurut is a traditional Bashkir fermented milk product that has the ability to neutralize the effects of eating large amounts of fat.

This is one of the features of Bashkir cuisine: to serve fermented milk products for meat dishes. This tradition is also implemented in the case of bishbarmak - perhaps the main symbol of Bashkir cuisine. The traditional bishbarmak is made with boiled meat and salma. The finished dish is abundantly sprinkled with herbs and trimmed with smoke.

The semi-nomadic lifestyle led to the presence in the culinary tradition of the Bashkirs of many products of a long shelf life. These include boiled and cured horse meat, lamb, dried berries, cereals, honey.

A special place in Bashkir cuisine is occupied by fermented milk products. In addition to the already mentioned kurut, it is worth calling ayran and kumys. It is believed that kumys is a traditional drink of mare's milk for many peoples, prepared by the Bashkirs right during their wanderings: a vessel of milk was tied to the saddle and so dangled during the day.

It is worth saying that almost all dishes of Bashkir cuisine are nutritious and relatively simple to prepare. The reason for this is still the same - the nomadic lifestyle of the Bashkir people.

Traditional and very revered in Bashkiria is the tea party rite. For Bashkirs, tea drinking is a full-fledged meal that can successfully replace breakfast or lunch. The thing is that tea drinking among the Bashkir people implies the obligatory presence on the table of all kinds of pies, cheesecakes, sour cream, jam, honey and even boiled meat and sausage. Bashkirs invariably drink tea with milk. They are so used to this that they often do not ask the guest whether he should add milk to tea or not.

As already mentioned, honey is an indispensable attribute of the Bashkir tea party. Local honey has long been famous for its taste and healthy properties. Honey for the Bashkirs is able to replace all other sweets. Well, except perhaps, chuck-chuck, which, however, is also prepared for honey. Chuck-chuck is a mandatory decoration of any festive table, the secrets of its preparation are passed along the female line from generation to generation.

This is such an unusual Bashkir cuisine appears before us. The cuisine, which was formed in difficult conditions, but nevertheless managed to maintain a balance and find harmony between the taste and benefits of traditional dishes.