Rice and Stir-Fries

Appears in

Taste Tibet: Family recipes from the Himalayas

Published 2022

About

The recipes in this chapter are a celebration of all the vegetables and other ingredients that Yeshi learned to cook with as a child. In the valleys of eastern Tibet, where he grew up, there was always a good deal of variety. This section showcases some of the dishes he enjoyed from a young age, plus a few others he has picked up along the way.

Historically, rice was an expensive commodity in Tibet. It was carried in on the backs of porters and yaks over frozen peaks, on journeys that could take up to four months. Imported alongside tea, sugar, spices and dried fruit from neighbouring countries such as India, China and Nepal, rice was once a byword for riches. The name of one of Tibet’s three leading monasteries, the Drepung, literally translates as ‘rice heap’ – a nod to its spiritual, rather than material or culinary, wealth.

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