The distance between Alchi in Ladakh and Chennai is more than 3,000 kilometres. In a country where language, culture and food can change every few hundred kilometres, it is of little surprise that what lands on a plate in Alchi can look very different from what is cooked in Chennai. That distance is about to shrink. Award-winning Chef Nilza Wangmo of Alchi Kitchen is travelling to Chennai with a suitcase packed with ingredients from home like yak cheese, turtle beans, wild chives, juniper berries, barley and more, to cook a Ladakhi feast at Zhouyu, as part of Zhouyu Hosts, a collaborative kitchen programme by Chef Chindi Varadarajulu. “Zhouyu Hosts is about us creating a platform for chefs from other regions to come and use our kitchen to showcase what they know and what their cuisine is about. It also allows people in Chennai to experience that without having to go there. We want to do it as real as it can get,” says Chindi. “I think by eating somebody’s food, you’ll be able to understand their culture a little more. You’ll be able to understand how they live a little more,” she adds.
Cooking at the Alchi Kitchen, Leh
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Special Arrangement
Nilza was a natural choice for the Ladakh edition, Chindi says, given her work in preserving and teaching the region’s food traditions. “Ladakh is a high-altitude, cold, dry region with a short agricultural season. So historically, people had to be extremely resourceful. That is why grains such as barley are important. Everyone should understand how people like us survive at this altitude. People often think we eat only Maggi and momo,” says the chef who hails from Alchi, located 70kms from Leh. The meal will begin with Gur-gur cha, Ladakhi salt tea made with milk and butter. “The tea is made with two different kinds of tea leaves, one that gives a vibrant colour and another one grown by me, which gives only mild colour. The tea is brewed, milk, salt and butter are added and churned with a special wooden churner,” she says. The tea is paired withkambir, a traditional sourdough bread that she says is a staple in her kitchen. The menu will also feature chutagi, a Ladakhi pasta that Nilza describes as a dish many Indians may not know exists. Made into small, bite-sized pieces, the pasta is cooked with Ladakhi spices including caraway seeds, wild chives and wild garlic. “Through Ladakhi pasta, people from around the country can get to know that India also has pasta in its culinary tradition,” she says over a call from Leh as she packs up the spices to bring to Chennai.
