The dastarkhan is the ceremonial tablecloth spread on the floor or a carpet, around which the Turco-Mongol and Timurid meal is arranged. First come nan (flatbread) and fermented drinks, then shorba (soup), the meat or rice dish, and finally dried fruit sweets. Among nomads, the meal is simpler, centered on boiled meat, fermented milk, and bread. At Tamerlane's imperial banquets, the dastarkhan stretched for dozens of meters, with dishes arriving in successive waves.

Fat-tailed sheep fat (dumba) is the fundamental cooking fat of Central Asian cuisine. Melted at the start of cooking, it perfumes rice, soups, and meats with a rich, characteristic aroma that neither butter nor oil can replicate. In Samarkand plov, it gives the rice its golden color and creaminess. Fat-tailed sheep were a marker of wealth in the Turco-Mongol steppes.