Azerbaijan

🇦🇿Baku, Azerbaijan

Ovdukh

Ovduq

Cold soup of yogurt thinned with water over cucumber, herbs, garlic and often shredded boiled beef, eaten in the summer heat.

🇦🇿Sheki, Azerbaijan

Piti

Lamb, chickpeas, chestnuts, saffron and a lump of tail fat sealed in an individual clay crock and baked overnight; drunk as broth first, then mashed with bread as a second course.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Qatiq

Qatıq

Thick soured milk used as a sauce, a soup base and a drink — poured over dolma, whisked into dovga, thinned into ayran.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Qazmaq

The crust at the bottom of the plov pot — flatbread, dough or a saffron-yogurt batter — lifted out in sheets and served on top of the rice.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Qovurma

Lamb fried hard in its own fat with onion and turmeric until the edges caramelise, sometimes potted under fat to keep.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Qutab

Half-moon of paper-thin dough folded over greens, pumpkin or minced lamb, dry-cooked on a saj and brushed with butter.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Sabzi Qovurma Plov

Səbzi qovurma plov

Lamb browned with a great weight of chopped coriander, dill, spring onion and fenugreek, served beside saffron rice.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Sac Ichi

Sac içi

Lamb and vegetables cooked on a domed steel saj over a fire and brought to the table on the same pan, still spitting.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Shah Plov

Şah plov

Saffron rice, dried fruit and lamb sealed inside a drum of overlapping lavash, baked until the bread crust goes deep gold, then cut open like a cake.

🇦🇲Armenia

Shashlik

Шашлық

Shashlik is marinated meat grilled on skewers with onion and rendered fat, a shared Eurasian form rather than a single national dish.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Shekerbura

Şəkərbura

Crescent pastry packed with ground almond or walnut and sugar, its surface crimped with tweezers into wheat-ear patterns.

🇦🇿Sheki, Azerbaijan

Sheki Halva

Şəki halvası

Layers of rice-flour vermicelli built up with ground hazelnut and saffron syrup, pressed in a copper tray and cut into diamonds.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Sherbet

Şərbət

Cold infusion of fruit, rose petals, basil seed or mint sweetened lightly and drunk with plov and at weddings.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Shirin Plov

Şirin plov

Sweet plov of saffron rice with dried apricot, raisin, chestnut and almond fried in butter — served at weddings and Novruz.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Shor

Şor

Fresh salted curd drained in cloth, eaten spread on bread or folded into pastry fillings.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Shor Gogal

Şor qoğal

Layered round bun with a savoury filling of turmeric, fennel, caraway and salt worked between the sheets of dough.

🇱🇧Kayseri, Lebanon

Sucuk

Sucuq

A dry, spicy fermented sausage made from ground beef mixed with tail fat, garlic, cumin, and red pepper, stuffed into casings and air-dried. First mentioned in the 11th century by Mahmud al-Kashgari, sucuk is sliced and grilled, fried with eggs for breakfast, or added to dishes like bean stews. Afyonkarahisar is renowned for its sucuk production tradition.

🇹🇲Turkmenistan

Suzma

Süzmə

A thick, tangy Azerbaijani drained yogurt spread, made by hanging qatiq in cloth to remove whey, seasoned with salt and garlic.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Three Sisters Dolma

Badımcan dolması

Aubergine, pepper and tomato all hollowed and stuffed with the same lamb-and-herb mix, cooked together in one pot.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Tike Kebab

Tikə kabab

Cubes of lamb marinated in onion juice and grilled over vine or fruit-wood coals, served with grilled tomato and raw onion in sumac. Liver and other offal skewers are a serving form, not a separate canonical kebab.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Tonir Bread

Թոնրի հաց

Thick round loaves baked against the wall of the same clay pit oven as lavash, blistered on one side and flat on the other.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Turshu

Turşu

Vegetables — small aubergines, garlic heads, cabbage, green tomatoes — pickled in vinegar and brine and served with every meat dish.

🇦🇿Azerbaijan

Yarpaq Dolmasi

Yarpaq dolması

Vine leaves rolled around lamb mince, rice, mint and fennel and packed tight in a pot, served hot with garlic yogurt. Azerbaijani cooks also use cabbage leaves for dolma, but the vine-leaf form remains this item's identity.