Tag #135564 - Interview #78023 (Fridric Iavet)

The food was very different from the one we had home. There was no pork or potatoes. Our greatest wish when we came back was for mum to make for us a pot of potatoes and a pot of corn mush. They ate turtle, though. Near our place there was a turtlery - they ate the liver and different parts of the turtle. The mutton was the most expensive, especially the 'caracal' kind. This kind of sheep had a tail that weighed 10-15 kg. Because it was too heavy, the Uzbeks put wheels under the tail, so that the sheep didn't get tired. You could also find horse and camel meat. The milk - camel's and sheep's milk - was very fat because of the climate. There was no cream - they used the skin of milk.

The fruits were very good, very sweet. The grapes had over 30% sugar, and people made raisins from the seedless grapes. The Uzbeks came to the marketplace with sacks of raisins to sell. They sold them in half a kilo or a kilo. If someone went into a teahouse, he would buy half a kilo of raisins to have with the tea. People drank a lot of tea in Uzbekistan, because the heat was very strong. We drank tea as well because the climate required it. They had a sort of green tea, which went very well without sugar, only with raisins. There were no chairs in the teahouse. People sat on the floor, and smoked pipe. They also sold peaches and apricots - fresh or dried. They were very tasty.