Nowadays there are a lot of restaurants of Uzbek cuisine in Saint Petersburg but the best of them is considered to be Caravan-Sarai. This fact was officially acknowledged in 2001 when Caravan Sarai was awarded as the best restaurant of national cuisine in Saint Petersburg. At this restaurant everyone is welcomed with oriental hospitality, attentive waitresses lavish care upon the guests and offer them to taste the viands of Uzbek cuisine in the charming atmosphere of the East.
The interior of the restaurant makes you believe that you are in some Asian town, in Samarqand for example. To recreate the atmosphere of Eastern countries as likely as possible somon (clay for wall), bricks and tiles have been brought from Tashkent. Traditional ornamentation on the walls, pottery and textiles seem to preserve the sheen of the Eastern burning sun. The waitresses, attentive and amiable, are dressed in traditional clothes - bright oriental robes and embroidered skullcaps.
The dishes of Uzbek cuisine are tasty, nourishing and as a rule not very spicy. Traditional manty, begach, chuchvara, samsa are cooked by the chef of the highest rank. The most famous Uzbek dish is plov (rice dish with vegetables, meat or dried fruits), that can be "morning" and "evening". Morning plov is usually cooked for some solemn occasion or a great holiday; it is light, with raisins and a lot of spicery. The evening plov is dark. Many dishes of Uzbek cuisine have become so popular that they are not treated no more as exotic ones. But home boiled or summer sausages from horsemeat (kazy) are quite an extraordinary dish for a European; still it is really worth trying. The bounteous dinner is usually accomplished with fragrant tea and confectionary, which is highly valued for natural components such as nuts, dried apricots, prunes, raisins and sweetmeat.
The service is very prompt: any dish is served within 10-15 minutes, so the Caravan-Sarai Restaurant is a good location for a quick bite to eat and an ideal place to spend evening in the charming atmosphere.
Daily since 20:00 the guests can admire a fabulous show - eastern beauties perform a belly dance.
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