So, I went in search of lamb for this experiment. My local grocer, the amazing Kroger store, has tons of different products for sale. They have shrimp from Norway, they have Atlantic salmon raised in the Pacific ocean in Chile, they have cheese from France, they have wine from Australia, they have Jerk Sauce from Bermuda, they have cow parts galore, they have pork, they have veal, they have sharks, etc. But try to find a decent piece of lamb. All they have are some very high priced lamb shoulder chops which are mostly full of bone.
I thought briefly about substituting some other meat in place of the lamb. But no, this is supposed to be authentic Central Asian plov, so it must be lamb. So, I paid a lot of money for a little lamb. But, the label on the package assured me that I was at the "right store" and that I was paying the "right price". This sounds like something I would hear if I was bartering for a decent carpet at the Tolkuchka bazaar immediately after the vendors had determined I was not from their country and easy to fool.Actually, I suspect that if I had been at the Tolkuchka bazaar, I probably could have purchased an entire lamb for not much more than I paid for these two pathetic pieces of Kroger sheep shoulders. Of course, at the Tolkuchka, I could have purchased an entire camel, provided I had brought my truck with me.
So, I brought the lamb home and carefully removed the meat from the bones. I chopped the meat into small pieces and I also kept the bones to use in the plov. My good friend told me that you should use the bones during the cooking process because they add flavor. I'm not sure I believe this, but I thought I would give the bones a try anyway.
