Azerbaijan and particularly the region of Lankaran is distinguished for its long-lived people. Scientists explain this phenomenon by several factors, and one of the most important among them is healthy food and regular nutrition. These cookery traditions had been developed and formed by practice of many generations.

Even now you can easily feel that local people value the succession principle in this subject. Really endless range of traditional dishes with high nutrition features, remarkable taste and beautiful appearance, so typical for Azeri National cookery, provides additional interest for living and physical ability for that.

Cooking process specifics, taste of the food, as well as broad usage of hot spices and numerous seasonings advocate for classifying Azerbaijan Cuisine as an Oriental one. Accessibility of plenty of vegetables, fruit, nice smelling verdure and spices traditionally inspired local cookers and they created really great variety of National dishes.

Turaj (black grouse)

Any experienced gourmand visiting Azerbaijan would be amazed by fine taste and delicate flavor of the local Cuisine. And regional cookery specifics of different parts of Azerbaijan are formed, first of all, by dominant local food resources of the areas. So, Lankaran is rich with both sea food and river fish, as well as vegetables and rice, thus local cookery is traditionally based on these products.

They in Lankaran use to cook plenty of delicious fish dishes. The region's being located on the coast of the Caspian Sea and the area's being rich with rivers and lakes plays the main role in the Lankaran Cuisine's providing really endless variety of fish dishes. Especially tasteful are lavangi (stuffed fish with nuts), sturgeon barbecue, fish baked in clay, kutum (Black sea roach) a'la Azeri, balyq-pilaf (pilaf with fish), dolma with fish, balyq-chikhirtma (souse with fish) etc.

One of the most popular main courses in Lankaran, same as at all other regions of Azerbaijan, is the rice pilaf. Archaeological excavations prove that the rice cultivation at subtropics of the Lankaran-Astara zone has a history of more than thousand years. Namely in Lankaran they serve this dish with various additions cooked from fish (balyq-pilaf, kyukyu-pilaf) and poultry (juja-pilaf, toyuq-pilaf).

As the hot season starts, usage of fish goes sufficiently lower and instead they sharply increase using of vegetables. On all seasons the local menu includes verdure variety, which often goes served without any mechanical or thermo preparations, just cleaned and washed. They serve it as a salad, along with the main course.