“We haven’t done a food blog in a long time!” Emily said in what I imagine was a hungry moment during The Long March. Earlier in our travels, it had been pointed out to us by several people that a large number of our posts were either about or greatly described our food.
Hugo, our brother-in-law, mentioned that it was clear that we went to the beach and ate – but what else did we do? When we were on Patmos, that was a fair question. For the record, we worked and walked around too. But not that much else. We often miss Patmos.
With Thanksgiving upon us and Turkey behind us, it seems like the time to put the craziness of Nepal aside and once again discuss the contents of our dinner…and lunch…and breakfast.
But first I want to discuss an important piece of food discovered at the end of Istanbul – candied chestnut, candied pumpkin pudding. I believe that when a country called Turkey invents such a phenomenally Thanksgiving-esque dessert, Americans should take the hint. Let us all be thankful to Turkey for that – it is delicious.
In Nepal, there is no pudding, no turkey and scarcely a Turk for that matter. Instead there is dal bhat tarkari – a platter of rice, lentils, curried vegetables and a spicy pickled vegetable or sauce for accent flavoring. Some people toss in spinach to the mix and non-vegetarian restaurants toss in the option to add chicken or “mutton” aka goat. Once in awhile they also offer fish. We never trust fish.
Nepalis usually eat dal bhat twice a day. There’s some variety in that they change up the vegetables for the curry and the variety of dal – the lentils. Emily and I like the yellow dal best, but black is pretty common and sometimes a watery greenish-brown too. The pickled item/sauce changes frequently. Emily prefers the spiciest varieties and especially likes it when they add dried chilis to the spinach and the dal.
Sometimes, instead of having dal bhat – bhat being rice – Nepalis substitute dried, beaten rice which is considered more special and appropriate to holidays. Poorer people who cannot afford rice sometimes have millet and/or corn meal with their meals.
We’ve had a lot of dal bhat tarkari.
While I like it especially when I’m really hungry, my preference is for momo. Nepalis regard it as snack food, but I’ll order one or two platters and make a meal of these tasty dumplings which combine the best of Chinese and Indian concepts. Imagine a Chinese-style dumpling filled with vegetables and/or meat with Indian spices. It’s like eating the best of West Asia all in one bite.
They come in a variety of fillings – but most common are veggie, chicken, and buff (water buffalo). Occasional strike-out varieties include potato, cheese-potato, spinach, spinach-potato and cheese. While most momo connoisseurs agree that buff is the premier momo, I have recently come to develop an appreciate for chicken and potato cheese. But buff was my first-love momo and always the most beautifully presented.
There are a number of “snack” foods that are common as well – especially when you have a group of Nepalis sitting around socializing. These include chili chicken, buff or paneer (cheese), and a number of other versions of spiced meats and vegetables. There’s one very spicy version of buff – sandeko – that Emily likes as well as a dried, fermented, spiced spinach called gundruk. Emily goes absolutely nuts for gundruk. I think it tastes like spicy seaweed.
Compared to Greece and Turkey, food preparation here has a lot less focus on esthetic presentation. Nepalis prefer substance and pour their love into the spices and flavors. Except at tourist restaurants, dal bhat is an all-you-can-eat thing. Nepalis want to make sure you’re full. So, before you finish even half your plate, someone appears with one or more bowls of food from which they refill your plate. At Emily’s Nepali family’s house, one of the older sisters stands over eaters as if refilling their plates is an Olympic sport.
Of course, Nepalis have a much faster eating time than we do. Meals are eating time. No talk – just eat. Socializing is done before and after – thus the emphasis on quick refills.
Nepalis don’t really have breakfast – just Nepali masala tea which is made in milk. It’s pretty heavy and sometimes they use water buffalo milk, which is extra rich. So in restaurants, breakfast is really a Western breakfast – eggs, omelets, toast, fruit, etc.
The one culinary cross-over is yogurt or what they refer to as curd. Curd here is good. It’s usually made from buffalo milk, so it’s extra creamy and like the name suggests, it’s sort of a chunky, blocky yogurt rather than a smooth, creamy Greek or Yoplait kind of thing. I can be happy with a bowl of plain curd for breakfast or maybe some curd and honey.
Then there’s the snack of snacks – yak cheese. Somewhat like a softer, creamier parmesan, the deep flavor and mild pungency of yak cheese makes for a good afternoon snack. Let’s be honest – the primary appeal is that it comes from a yak. How often does one get the chance to enjoy yak products?
Nepali custom doesn’t seem to value the refrigeration of yak cheese, so we usually buy it at the government dairy where they have pieces hermetically sealed and refrigerated. Everywhere else it’s just a block on the counter of the shop where the flies help finely age it for you.
Emily and I have recently had a strange juxtaposition when it comes to dessert. I’m the kind of person who can skip dinner and eat dessert. In fact when Emily’s mom, Susan has made me her amazing cheesecake, that’s exactly what I do to Emily’s shock and horror.
In Greece, Turkey and Israel there were the great baklava expeditions in which I made it my personal job to sample the best and worst of baklava to further the public interest and understanding of baklava.
Through the hard work of searching and tasting and searching and tasting some more, I discovered that Israel has some of the best baklava, while Greece had very few great baklavas by comparison. However….there is one great baklava at Koukos restaurant on Rhodes and another at the bakery closest to the ferry dock in Patmos. Let the work be recorded.
No one needs to know what happened when I was left on my own in France.
Here, Emily is the dessert eater. Nepali/Indian sweets called burfees have captured her taste buds. They are a milk-based candy which involve a unique mixture of creamy and very sweet with some occasional nuts in a soft, sometimes doughy texture. I wouldn’t have pegged it as Emily’s thing. But it is.
I like the ones that are predominantly cardamom flavored. But honestly, I can take them or leave them.
I love Indian khir – their version of rice pudding. The Nepali take on khir is somewhat lacking and not widely available anyway. So dessert here has lost its luster for me.
Perhaps that, in combination with The Long March, stomach troubles and no longer being in Greece and France have led me to some weight loss. Technically, it was first noticed in France and has now come to the point that my belt is what keeps my jeans on – and not so nicely. I’m waiting for Bombay where there should be a better supply and selection to get new ones.
We’ll see what happens, but I have always lost weight in Asia. Emily is baffled because it’s not like I don’t eat plenty. In my honest opinion – especially when we were in Istanbul – scientists should be flocking to study me because there’s really no logical explanation for my weight loss. I’d like to give local parasites credit, but it started in Cannes.
My best explanation at this point is that we left America which always induces weight loss for me, only Greece came along and held it off. Perhaps the real scientific study needs to focus on how I didn’t gain weight in Greece – because that was truly absurd.
Tomorrow, the U.S. Embassy is hosting a turkey and pumpkin pie reception for an hour and a half. We may go – it may be the only meal our tax dollars ever buy us – plus, it could be cool to see the Ambassador’s Residence.
Otherwise, on Thanksgiving, we’ll be thinking of everyone at home over momo and dal bhat tarkari.
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