Fortunately, when it came time to eat the sheep’s heart, my
stomach was roiling with drunken hunger. My guide and I had driven all day
across an ocean of green hills, stopping only at the occasional ger to ask
directions and once in a one-store town to buy enormous bottles of beer from an
eight-year-old girl. When we finally arrived in this faraway Mongolian
river-valley, our home for the night, we had sea-legs from being jostled all
day in the Land Cruiser. We hadn’t eaten. We’d drunk the skunky beer on the way
and, once we arrived, our host welcomed us with shot after shot of grassy,
fermented mare’s milk. I was told that, packed as it was with vitamins, the
mare’s milk was the closest the nomads here usually got to a vegetable.
Our dinner would be comprised of one ingredient: a sheep. If there was even any
salt on it, I couldn’t taste it, though maybe by the time we ate my palate was
ruined by booze and smoke from the bonfire. My guide, our host, and the family
from the neighboring ger—that is, everyone for miles around—had come over to
enjoy the feast with us. The preparation was simple and steeped in centuries of
tradition. Get the neighbors; start the fire; slaughter the sheep by slitting
its chest, reaching a hand into its warm body, and pulling a particular artery
from its beating heart; boil the butchered sheep in huge pots set over the
bonfire; while the rest of the meat boils, spear the organs with sharp sticks
and sear them marshmallow-style over the fire; eat the offal hot, heart first.
I can hardly say one meal gave me a deep understanding of
Mongolian culture. Still, I got to taste a few things at the core of the nomads’
experience: a long journey, a bonfire under the stars, a shepherd’s summer
feast, and the hunger for company in a faraway place.
