What to eat in Turkmenistan

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• What else should the list cover? Desserts and pastriesNon-alcoholic drinks

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1. Try dograma

   Churek bread crumbled by hand with boiled lamb and onion, covered with hot meat broth. A festive and ritual dish, prepared for major occasions.

   The bread is crumbled by hand rather than cut, which gives the texture. It is eaten with a spoon from a shared bowl, with the meat added on top.

2. Eat ishlekli

   A large round pie of chopped lamb and onion baked in hot ash or a tandoor. It comes from Balkan province and is cut into wedges like a pie.

   The meat is knife-chopped rather than minced. The pie is baked sealed so the juices stay inside; cut it over a platter.

3. Try chekdirme

   Lamb fried with potato, tomato and onion in a cauldron until it becomes a thick stew. A home dish, also cooked over a fire on the road.

   The vegetables go in layers and are not stirred until the end. It comes with churek for mopping the sauce.

4. Eat Turkmen plov

   Rice with lamb, carrot and onion cooked in a cauldron: a close relative of the Uzbek version, but more often with dried fruit and less cumin.

   It is served on a communal platter with the meat placed on top. A tomato and onion salad comes alongside to cut the fat.

5. Try chorba

   A rich lamb-on-the-bone soup with coarsely cut potato, carrot and tomato. The everyday first course.

   The vegetables are cut coarse on purpose so they hold their shape. The broth is drunk from a bowl and the meat eaten separately.

6. Eat gutap

   Fried half-moon pastries filled with meat, herbs or pumpkin. Street and home food, eaten hot and by hand.

   Pumpkin gutap are seasonal, arriving in autumn, and noticeably sweeter. The dough should be thin and the filling juicy.

7. Get churek from the tandoor

   A round tandoor flatbread baked daily and served with everything. Bread here is torn by hand and never placed upside down.

   Fresh churek is soft and keeps a day; when it dries it is soaked in broth. Tandoor breads are thinner in the middle than at the rim, which is normal.

8. Try Caspian fish

   Pike-perch, carp and sturgeon from the Caspian, fried, baked or cured as balyk. In the west, around Turkmenbashi and Awaza, the fish is fresh and cheap.

   Sturgeon is subject to catch restrictions, so ask about the source. Plainly fried fish with onion and lemon is usually better here than elaborate dishes.

9. Try manti and borek

   Large steamed manti filled with lamb, pumpkin or camel, and borek, boiled dumplings in broth. Everyday home cooking.

   Pumpkin manti are meat-free and as common as the meat kind. They come with soured milk or sour cream rather than a sauce.

10. Try Turkmen melons

    Melons from Akhal and Mary provinces: dense, fragrant and very sweet. They have a national holiday of their own on the second Sunday of August.

    The season runs July to September, and vaharman is considered the best variety. Dried melon braids are sold all year and travel well.

11. Try pishme Desserts and pastries

    Diamonds of fried dough, puffy inside, put on the table with tea. Simple baking made when guests arrive.

    Fresh they are light and hollow; a day later they go dense, so eat them the same day. They come with honey or condensed milk rather than plain.

12. Buy dried fruit and halva Desserts and pastries

    Dried apricots, raisins, dried melon, whole apricots and sesame halva: what sits on the table from the start and what travellers take home.

    Markets let you taste before buying, and that is standard. Dried melon is sold in braids and keeps for months.

13. Drink green tea Non-alcoholic drinks

    Unsweetened green tea from a bowl filled a third of the way: the drink of the day and the first answer to heat. It is refilled constantly.

    A full bowl hints that the guest should leave; a part-filled one means stay. Black tea is drunk less often and mostly in winter.

14. Try chal Non-alcoholic drinks

    Fermented camel milk: sour, faintly fizzy and refreshing. A desert drink regarded as restorative.

    Fresh chal is mildly sour; left too long it turns sharp, so take it cold and same-day. It is drunk chilled, especially in the heat.

15. Try agaran and ayran Non-alcoholic drinks

    Agaran is thick, rich camel milk cream eaten with churek; ayran is a diluted salted fermented milk drink.

    Agaran is spooned onto bread rather than drunk; in density it is closer to butter. Ayran goes with fatty meat.