A Feast Fit for Khans

An American scholar digs into the sort of debauched Mongolian feast that, alas, we’ve only had in our wildest dreams:

Sheep fat! Stuffed beef intestine! Goat’s head! Petrified curds, harder than jawbreakers! And, of course, buuz. I ate them all, these foods that not so long ago had my fork shaking. Two bottles of vodka appeared, and were gone. In the corner, a newborn calf slept, then stood up; when it started to pee a boy put a jar beneath it as if it were a leaking roof. A little girl danced to