Xinjiang: The Silk Road Kitchen

Xinjiang Uyghur cuisine is the most un-Chinese food in China — influenced by Central Asian, Turkish, Persian, and Mongol traditions rather than Han Chinese. The Uyghur people are Turkic-speaking Muslims whose cuisine centres on lamb, cumin, flatbread (naan), pilaf (polo), and hand-pulled noodles (laghman). Xinjiang cuisine is the Silk Road on a plate: cumin from the Middle East, noodles from China, lamb from the Central Asian steppe, and dried fruits from the oasis towns along the trade route.

• Uzbek plov (the Central Asian pilaf — same dish, different border), Turkish kebab tradition (same cumin-lamb-skewer DNA), Afghan qabuli palaw (rice-lamb-carrot-raisin — the Afghan twin), Persian polow