Azeri Kitchen: Piti

I’ve talked about food here before, a while ago.  But I thought it was necessary to have a good food post after I had Piti (like pee-tee) for the first time ever.  Azerbaijanis, like many midwesterners, love their savory foods.  Food with lots of salt and butter can go a long way here.  And they love a good hot soup, especially on cold, wet, winter days.

Piti is no exception to the savory-flavoured goodness that comes out of an Azerbaijani kitchen.  It’s a dish that comes from Şeki (Sheki), more towards the north of Azerbaijan, and it filled me up real good.  You start with a clay jar filled with meat, potatoes, chickpeas, and some sort of fatty substance, and it’s all soaking in a hot, buttery broth.  Then, you get your bowl and tear up pieces of fresh tandir bread into it and pour the hot, buttery broth all over it.  You let the bread soak it up for a minute and then pour the meat, potatoes, and chickpeas into the bowl.  You mash it up, making a sort of stew and eat it with fresh greens, like garlic and green onions.  It’s fantastic.  I could eat that every day.  It’s hard not to like something soaking in hot, buttery goodness.

Wikipedia has description of Piti here, but ours didn’t include tomatoes.  I’ve had both the version with mutton and with turkey.  Both were fantastic.

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