As an avid foodie, eating for me is almost half the fun of traveling. To start, the Mongolians don’t eat “Mongolian barbecue,” apparently that’s a made up American concoction. Like many things in Mongolia, the cuisine is kind of separated into two camps: city and countryside.

This is banshtai shoal (dumpling soup) and buzz in the back eaten at a guanz. It’s so good it was almost gone before I could snap a picture.

In the cities, the food is very much a blend of the two countries it’s sandwiched between: Russia and China. The bulk of the cuisine consists of noodles, rice and dumplings with mutton as the main protein, though other meats are available. The dumplings definitely took center stage. Buuz, as they call it, is minced mutton (usually) wrapped in a thin dough and either steamed or fried. Bansh is another type of dumpling boiled and served in soup. The interesting thing is that you can kind of see the progression of the dumpling from Asia up to Russia (or is it from Russia down to Asia?). Bansh and buzz have the thinner wrapping like an Asian dumpling, while a fried meat dumpling (called khuushuur) has a thicker and more pastry-like wrap, kind of like a polish perogi. With a lack of western fast food, the Mongolian version of “fast food” are little cafeteria-style places called guanz that serve up dumplings and other noodle/rice dishes, fast and hot.

As far as vegetables go, it’s kind of slim pickin’s, however, there is always some kind of salad floating around that’s usually of the vinegar, cabbage and carrot variety and is clearly of Russian influence.

This is the yogurt hanging out, turning into yogurt. We ate a lot of milk products out of buckets.

In the countryside, eating can be a completely different experience. The nomads live off the land and eat mostly meat and milk products, in addition to a few basic veggies in the summertime and preserved cucumber or cabbage in winter. During the summer months milk and yogurt is plentiful, as is butter. The yogurt is extra tangy. They also make a slightly alcoholic drink out of fermented mares milk called airag. It’s a bit similar to Turkish ayran or Indian Lassi, but tangier. The Mongols sometimes even take it one step further and distill the airag (or other milk) into a clear vodka they call “yogurt vodka” in English (I have no idea what they call this in Mongolian). It’s about the strength of Korean soju (around 20%) and it’s NOT, I repeat NOT for the sensitive palate. Imagine the most sour yogurt you’ve ever tasted that’s turned quite a bit and add a little alcohol to it. My husband didn’t mind it. I, however, almost tossed my cookies after about the third or fourth large shot and had to politely decline their offer of more.

A cookie-dough like sweet.

During the winter months, the nomads mostly live off meat and fat. Probably the most delicious nomadic culinary experience is khorkhog, where meat (usually lamb but sometimes a goat kid or marmot) is cooked with hot stones. They also preserve the milk by making aaruul, aka dried milk curds. This is often offered with tea when visiting a ger in winter or summer. It’s rock hard and tastes about like a parmesan rind that has been left out on the counter for a few weeks. Not horrible, but it’s no fine cheese.

Aaruul, dried milk curds

During our home stay, our hosts prepared a dessert-like treat that I can’t seem to find a name for. It’s basically like a shortbread cookie dough and is made over the stove with flour, sugar and butter. The interesting part is that they basically clarify the butter, then take out the clarified part using only the milk solids. They then add the clarified butter back in at the end. It has the taste and consistency of raw cookie dough even though it’s kind of been cooked. We were served this tasty treat before dinner. They make a lot at once, so with the leftover dough they form little patties and leave them out on the ger’s roof to dry in the sun so they are left with a cookie.

This is the bucket in which they make the airag.