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.
Culture
Culture
Samarkand bread and plov, silk carpets and paper, Navruz and the chaikhana — the living heritage of the city.
Culture
Cuisine
Samarkand bread
A tandoor-baked round with a thin, stamped centre, a plump rim and a glossy crust — Samarkand’s signature taste and the classic gift to carry home.
Tandoor samsa
Flaky pastries filled with lamb, onion and tail fat and baked on the wall of a tandoor — Samarkand’s favourite breakfast.
Kabob (shashlik)
Lamb, liver and minced-meat skewers grilled over charcoal and served with raw onion, vinegar and hot bread — the smoke that drifts down every Samarkand street.
Manti
Large steamed dumplings from a tiered steamer, filled with hand-chopped lamb, onion and tail fat — or with sweet pumpkin.
Shurpa
A hearty soup of mutton, carrots, potatoes and herbs, either simply boiled or browned first, served in a deep bowl with bread.
Norin
A cold dish of hair-fine, hand-cut noodles tossed with shredded horsemeat and qazi sausage — the refined starter of weddings and big feasts.
Dimlama
A summer dish of meat and seasonal vegetables layered in a cauldron and braised slowly in their own juices, with almost no water.
Sumalak and halim
Two slow dishes of the Navruz table: sumalak, simmered overnight from the juice of sprouted wheat, and halim, a porridge of wheat and meat.
Nisholda, holvaytar and other sweets
Snow-white whipped nisholda, dark holvaytar, parvarda and novvot — the traditional sweets Samarkand serves with tea.
Green tea and tea etiquette
Green tea brewed in a pot and ‘returned’ to it three times — the opening of every conversation, deal and meal.
Grapes, melons and dried fruit
Grapes, melons, apricots and pomegranates from the sunny Zarafshan valley — fresh in summer, dried into raisins and apricots all year, and the brightest stalls in Samarkand’s bazaars.
Culture
Crafts
Samarkand paper
Creamy paper made by hand from mulberry bark and burnished with stone — the writing material of Islam’s golden age, revived in the village of Konigil.
Silk carpets
Hand-knotted carpets of naturally dyed silk — in Samarkand you can follow the whole journey from cocoon to finished rug in a single workshop.
Suzani and embroidery
Bold red and black rosettes on a white ground — the Samarkand suzani; alongside it, Urgut’s embroidered skullcaps and the work of today’s needlewomen.
Ceramics
From Afrasiyab bowls lettered in Kufic script to the glazed platters of Urgut’s potters, Samarkand ceramics span more than a thousand years.
Woodcarving
From the patterned doors of Gur-e-Amir and Rukhobod to the pillars of neighbourhood houses, Samarkand’s carvers have cut geometry and arabesque into wood for centuries.
Ganch carving
Snow-white patterns carved in ganch, a mix of gypsum and clay, and the gilded kundal of Tilya-Kori — the inner world of Samarkand’s monuments.
Tiles and majolica
The carved glazed terracotta of Shah-i-Zinda, the mosaics of the Registan portals and the tiles of Gur-e-Amir’s dome — the craft behind Samarkand’s famous blue.
Gold embroidery and skullcaps
Lavish embroidery in gold thread and skullcaps whose patterns change from oasis to oasis — needle crafts still alive in Samarkand and Urgut.
Culture
Traditions
Navruz
21 March, the spring equinox — a New Year welcomed with cauldrons of sumalak, green samsa, street festivities and neighbourhood clean-ups.
Mahalla and hashar
The neighbourhood community gathered around its guzar square, which shares weddings and funerals and keeps its streets in shape through hashar — the backbone of Samarkand life.
Hospitality and the dastarkhan
‘A guest ranks above your father’: in a Samarkand home the guest takes the seat of honour, and bread, tea, sweets and hot dishes reach the dastarkhan in turn.
Weddings (toʻy)
From matchmaking to the bride’s bow — an Uzbek wedding is a chain of rituals, and in Samarkand its story reaches back to the age of Timur.
Ramadan and the Eids
Iftar evenings in the month of fasting, the sweet table of Eid al-Fitr and the sacrifice of Eid al-Adha — festivals whose dates move each year with the lunar calendar.
The teahouse and the gap
Every mahalla’s teahouse is the daily club of its men, while the gap is a long-standing custom of friends taking turns to host one another.
Maqom and musical heritage
The subtle modes of Shashmaqom, Hoji Abdulaziz and his ‘Samarkand Ushshoq’, and the Sharq Taronalari festival — Samarkand’s musical memory.
Traditional dress
Ikat silk dresses, adras, embroidered robes and skullcaps — the traditional costume that colours Samarkand’s streets at weddings, Eid and Navruz.
The pilgrimage tradition
Shah-i-Zinda, Hazrat Khizr, Khoja Daniyar and Imam al-Bukhari — Samarkand has long been a city of shrines, and pilgrimage has its own etiquette and legends.
