Holey Moley, sometimes you get what you ask for. One of my wife’s cousins is soon getting married to a Shanghaiese gal that grew up in Inner Mongolia. I haven’t gotten the full story but her parents were either sent out to the Inner Mongolian countryside during the cultural revolution or were sent as some kind of experts during the cultural revolution. Often the two lines were blurred.
Now, I’ve spent a lot of time in Tibet but never made it to Mongolia, even though I would really like to go.
I have also wanted to try fermented mare’s milk for quite a long time.
When hearing that my wife’s cousin’s fiance’s parents were coming to Shanghai for the wedding, I kinda off the cuff asked the fiance if they could bring a bottle of Airag. Well, they did! I’ve got two kinda leather boda bags full of a commercial version sitting on the counter. Have to figure out the right time to crack these babies open and try 'em out.
Airag
The milk is filtered through a cloth, and poured into a large open leather sack (Khukhuur), which is usually suspended next to the entrance of the yurt. Alternatively, a vat from larch wood (Gan), or in modern times also from plastic, can be used. Within this container, it gets stirred with a wooden masher, in order to introduce air, and especially oxygen.
Airag refreshens and sparkles softly on the tongue. It contains a small amount of carbon dioxide, and up to 2% of alcohol. The taste is slightly sour, but quite agreeable after getting used to it. The exact taste depends both of the characteristics of the pastures and the exact method of production. The beverage is a rich source of vitamins and minerals for the nomads.
I know it as Kumiss (which the link spells differently). I remember it from an old episode of All in the Family.
I’d imagine it would taste sour, with the lactic acid in it.
I’ve had it as kymyz in Kyrgyzstan. I found it unusual but good - my gf (and pretty much every other non-local we met) thought it was like drinking vomit or stale buttermilk or something to that effect.
I also had fermented mare’s milk in Kyrgyzstan. To my mind it did indeed taste like being sick after drinking a glass of milk. This made me feel bad because the kid from the neighbouring yurt was obviously hoping to earn extra money by selling it to tourists.
I’m in Kazakhstan at the moment and we tried a bottle of Kumis from the shops down the road. It’s…bizarre, I’m not quite sure how I’d describe it. At the time I didn’t find it too horrible, but not great either, mostly just weird. Tasted a bit like something that would make more sense if it was a food than a drink (like something you’d serve with olives as an entrée).
One guy beforehand described it as “it’s like throwing up into someone’s vomit, then drinking that”, which I can understand
Not sure I’ll go out of my way to try it again, might give it another go if offered to me or maybe in a restaurant or something. Might have just had a dodgy supermarket version that wasn’t particularly good.
See, this is why I love the dope. I didn’t even know that you could do that to milk. I thought you could only make yoghurt or cheese out of it. Not an alcoholic beverage (which may or may not be tasty). I have to be honest it’s sounds a little dodgy. But I have to try this for myself some day.
Any body know of any sources outside of Mongolia/Eastern Europe? Or recipes too?
You can do plenty more things to milk – You can make Sour Cream and Whipped Cream Creme Fraiche and Clotted Cream. And that’s without separating it out to make whey and other stuff. I’m amazed at the number of weird things I didn’t know could be done to dairy products as a kid. Some of them I only learned recently, like Creme Fraiche:
You can do plenty more things to milk – You can make Sour Cream and Whipped Cream Creme Fraiche and Clotted Cream and Clabber. And that’s without separating it out to make whey and other stuff. I’m amazed at the number of weird things I didn’t know could be done to dairy products as a kid. Some of them I only learned recently, like Creme Fraiche:
I’ve known creme fraiche since I was a kid (living that much closer to France ) but I always wondered about the name. “Fresh cream” that is anything but. Nice, though, on desserts.
hmmmm, not quite what I was expecting. My wife ended up wanting to try it more than myself, and we didn’t wait for anything more special than dinner one night to crack open a bottle. It was interesting…
Not all that special actually. Tasted kinda like slightly milky sake. The thing is that what I got was not a Genghis Khan Mongolian nomad special but a fermented and then distilled (20% alocohol) in a factory with ISO9001 certification. I’m sure their hoping for this to be the next next thing in NY and start selling boatloads of it to yuppies.
I will keep the second bottle unopened and hopefully it will sneak through US customs when I ship back my household goods next month.
) but I always wondered about the name. “Fresh cream” that is anything but. Nice, though, on desserts.