Bukharian cuisine is more than a traditional cooking style, it is a cultivation of history rolled up in every bite. Sampling this tradition will open your mind to the vibrant and eclectic world that is the Bukharian Community.
Food an Old Word Tradition
It is the food preparation and delectable menus that have people running toward the direction of these restaurants to sample the exquisite taste of old world cartes du jour. The menus beckon all people to enter and enjoy cuisine that is mouthwatering. Spices, my friend, enhance the menus.
Americans love to eat. In fact everyone loves to eat. When the newest immigrant on the block opens a restaurant, you can bet your last dollar the food will have you returning for more because Bukharian Jews love to prepare palatable meals.
Cook For At Least 500 Guests
Bukharian proudly identify their kitchen skills by cooking up meals to die for. The importance of knowing how to cook is summed up in the telling words of the owner of a restaurant who wryly offers that his great grandmother once declared that every woman should know how to cook for at least 500 people. That succinct and sage pronouncement is the answer to why so many Bukharians in America embrace the restaurant industry. How could great grandma, if she were alive today, ever fathom that men could be successful cooks.
Many of these Jewish people head out for some good chow and socializing at Bukharian restaurants in Rego Park. Talk about ancient practices that help the process along. In one restaurant, lamb rib kebabs are actively sizzling above a live charcoal fire, which is helped by a hair dryer that is hung near the grill. The hair dryer, you see, blasts the flames upwards to sear the meat.
Smirnoff Drinks and Sweets
Every imaginable language that represents their culture is heard as Smirnoff hard drinks begin to flow at another restaurant up the street. For those with a penchant for sweets, prepare yourself for deep-fried pies, the recipe of which traveled from the Soviet Union and other stops in between before arriving in Rego Park.
Food Cooked the Old Way
Try the restaurants’ lamb, potatoes, beets, rice and carrot cuisines. Spices favor cumin, chili and paprika and reveal the spice trades of India and China. Taste cuisine that is distinctly garlicky. Do try the chili-inspired Korean carrot salad that calls to mind the sad mass deportations of ethnic Koreans from far eastern Soviet Union locations at the behest of Joseph Stalin, the communist dictator.
Bakery Delicacy
Pay a visit to Bukharian bakeries in Rego Park where you may purchase a few samosa dessert delicacies that are enhanced with spiked cumin and baked in clay-lined ovens that are reminiscent of Indian tandoor ovens.
