Whether we live to eat or eat to
live, food forms an integral part of every culture. A lot about the people and
the place can be explored by understanding their culinary habits.
For example, at Jaigaon, an official India-
Bhutan border, we could see momos and phuchka/pani puri being sold in the same
food carts.
We had to simply cross the gate
in order to reach Phuntsholling. Indeed, the world seemed different on the
other side of the gate. There were no hawkers and hardly any rubbish could be
seen dumbed here and there. Just beside the gate we spotted Peyjorling, a
restaurant with two entrances and a small courtyard on which benches were laid.
We Indians are formatted to think that one section would be “ veg”,
whereas the other section would be “ non-veg”. But here it was different. They
said one section served authentic Bhutanese cuisine, while the section which
had the bar served “normal” food like chicken, chowmein ,rice/fried rice, thukpa and cheese momo. Like us ,you too must
be wondering, what is so extraordinary about Bhutanese cuisine that it had to be segregated?
To decipher that we had to cross the partition and take a
look at the board with the day’s menu ascribed on it. What we saw was a range of
Datsi: ema datsi(plain cheese curry), shamu datsi(mushroom cheese curry), kewa
datsi(potato cheese curry) and a range of Pa. The word Pa means fried in their
language. And they served fish pa( dry fish), pork pa and beef pa. Each of
these items came along with rice, pumpkin soup and eeze. Instead of water they
poured butter milk into our glasses which is popularly called Suja. And all
these came at a reasonable rate, ranging between Nr.70- Nr.
150 per plate.
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Pork Pa, Pork Ribs Pa, pumpkin soup,eeze and suja
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Beef Pa(left),kewa Datsi(right)
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Red rice, corn fried rice,kewa datsi, shamu datsi,
fried cottage cheesepumpkin soup,suja |
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These were the popular items. Now
let me come to the flavours. Like the people in Bhutan, their cuisine is very
simple in nature. Apart from salt, pepper and a variety of chilies, they hardly
use any spice. This is primarily because other spices are not produced in the
region. Well, talking about food production, we were surprised to know that The
Thunder Dragon gets all its meat, be it chicken, beef, pork or fish from India,
simply because their religion condemns animal slaughtering. Very recently, some
districts have started their own poultry farms in order to get easy supply of
eggs. This is the reason why the price of food in Bhutan rises with the
distance of a place from India as well as its escalation in altitude.
By the time we reached Thimpu,
Bhutanese New Year Carnival had begun. Most of the shops and restaurants were
closed. As we had planned to have our lunch at the market place, we did not
even place an order at the hotel where we were staying. So, based on online food
rating we hailed into The Bhutan Kitchen. Since it was an auspicious Period,
they were only serving vegetarian food. They charged Nr.450/- per buffet meal.
As it was already late, we decided to zero in at that restaurant. Honestly
speaking, though the décor was impressive, our culinary experience was
appalling. Apart from suja, they served us: red rice, corn fried rice, Shamu datsi,
kewa datsi, pumpkin soup and fried cheese(probably made from yak milk). With the feeling of
being robbed we devoured as much as we could .
In
order to reach the parking lot, we had to walk a mile. We could sense festivity
in the air and the capital was musing in its jocund spirit. Suddenly we bumped
into the Clock Tower. The place looked like the nucleus of an atom, as if the entire country was moving in to that place. Various food sellers from far
and wide had put up stalls. Chairs and tables were set. Musical bands were stringing tunes to popular
tracks. And the ever thickening crowd made its way into the gallery where they ate,
chatted, giggled and swayed to the tunes . It was indeed a befitting sight that
truly manifested the country’s “ Gross National Happiness” .The ambiance made
us regret our decision of having lunch at The Bhutan Kitchen. Not
only did the stalls offer authentic cuisine from different districts of Bhutan,
some of them served oven fresh pizza, patties and other bakery items. Be
it Kizom Café at Phuntsholling or those stalls in Thimpu, the bakeries in
Bhutan never failed to live up to our expectations. Quite obviously, we
plunged in to food once again.
It was there that we saw, the
much talked about BAFRA, Bhutan’s very own Royal Food Police. We saw their
offices at check points, but it was for the first time that we spotted the
officers in uniform, inspecting the food-stalls and doing their work.
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| Carnival at the Clock Tower |
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| The Food Stalls |
From Thimpu, we drove to Paro .
Personally, I felt there are more apple
trees than houses at that place. And why wouldn’t it be that way. Whenever a
layman thinks of Bhutan “ Druk” comes to his mind. There are also other local brands which are as
good if not better than Druk. All these fruit processing companies thrive on
the surplus fruit harvest of the country.
Although the government has built authorized “
farmer’s- market” for the buying and selling of fresh vegetables and fruits, yet we
saw some make-shift stalls on the sides of the spiral roads. Mostly they sold
oranges, red/golden apples, radish and yak cheese. People like me, who have
tried yak cheese in other places must try the Bhutanese cubes. I found them the
softest and juiciest of all. I also advise you to keep your eyes open as you
might find vans selling seasonal fruits at really cheap rate. Can you imagine
we found oranges at Nr.1/-
each.
In Paro we stuck to the food
offered by our Perli Cottage. We did so for two reasons: a)we didn't want any
more culinary misadventures, b) we got heavenly food at our hotel. On one of the days, the chef had cooked Saksha
maru for us ---- Bhutanese chicken curry. Trust me, it is a must try in Bhutan!
Last but not the least: liquor. Bhutan is also renowned for its
brewery. Drinking there is not a habit, as we could hardly spot a drunken
stupor. It is rather their custom. Drinking
together symbolizes family bonding and acceptance of friendship. We could not
lay our hands on “1906”---- premium vintage whiskey which is dispatched into
the market only after 15 years of controlled fermentation. Nevertheless, we brought some at an unimaginably low rate
and were not disappointed by the quality.
With that our trail ended. It was
time for us to cross the border to return to Jaigao. We tucked in our mouths
raw beetle seeds rolled inside lime smeared beetle leaves and munched our way
back home. Good Bye Thunder Dragon! We enjoyed your hospitality. Long live the
King!
The hotels here are constructed on the beach.
One can spend the day by sitting on the balcony watching the kaleidoscopic
changes of the sea transforming itself with the movement of the sun. Or stroll down to the shore to collect sea shells
during the dawn or feel the turtles twitching around the feet after dusk. I
went there in April. Maybe because of the season, the sea looked mesmerizing.
