LADAKH STUDIES 12, Autumn 1999 - International Association for ...

ook closes with a series of appendices including useful and important advice on health and
mountain safety.
With its overall emphasis on culturally and environmentally responsible tourism and wealth of
constructive suggestions in this regard, its detailed descriptions of routes, and the concise but
adequate sections with general and practical information about Ladakh and the principal stops along
the way there, this is a highly recommendable guidebook, certainly the best available in English
Ladakhi Kitchen [La-dwags-kyi-byang-sa]: Traditional and Modern Recipes from Ladakh.
Gabriele Reifenberg with Phuntsog Angmo Moljoks and Tsewang Dolma Lden. Leh: Melong
Publications, 1998. USD 10, UKP 6, or INR 195 (profits to the Women's Alliance of Ladakh).
Pp. 91, map, figures.
This is an attractive, well laid-out and practical recipe book suitable for use by anyone who enjoys
Ladakhi food and wants to make it at home. The book is a happy combination of social commentary
and recipe book, well-illustrated with line-drawings and attended by occasional Ladakhi poems; it
gives the name of each dish in Ladakhi and Western script along with a translation.
The choice of dishes laid out here is very wide, ranging from staples such as tsampa (ground
roast barley), zho (yoghurt) and tara (buttermilk), to recipes for more complex dishes such as rogan
josh. The context for each meal, which often details the origins of the dish and its ingredients, as
well as the reasons for its development, is given a very personal touch by the author, whose
pleasure in the research is clear: anecdotes of friends and occasions bring the meals to life. The
methods she has been taught by patient local cooks are lovingly detailed, and attempting to
reproduce the precise shape of noodles or steamed bread for each dish provides hours of
amusement in the Western kitchen.
The book is very usable and many travellers to Ladakh will be delighted to reproduce old
favourites like then-thuk and mok-mok, but Reifenberg does not limit herself to food of any one
ethnic origin, and there are recipes from the Muslim communities of Ladakh, from Kashmir and
Tibet, as well as modern forms of older traditional recipes. Reifenberg charts their development
where she can through the introduction of non-native ingredients, though she also touches on the use
of traditional ingredients, such as goat meat and milk from a yak that has just given birth (which
readers may find difficult to come by in the average Western supermarket!). We particularly
enjoyed the skyu—excellent for a winter's evening—and the Losar biscuits, which were
enthusiastically devoured by our visitors (all in the spirit of scientific analysis, of course).
If we had any particular reservation, it lies in the present introduction, which covers the history
of many of the ingredients involved in the book. Whilst this is certainly of interest to those with an
eye for political economy, and is undoubtedly essential in understanding the shape of modern
Ladakhi cuisine, much of the information is replicated alongside individual recipes, and with the
concentrated history of all those ingredients it is perhaps a little dry when read together. What
would perhaps be nice here in a second edition would be a section on Ladakhi etiquette, which
would help those of us less familiar with Ladakh to feel that we were doing the whole thing
properly!
As a whole, this is a very welcome work of cultural translation of the most enjoyable kind,
attractively produced and well-written. We look forward to the sequel (if only because the one we
have is now completely covered in noodle-dough!).
Note: The book is available from book sellers in Leh bazaar and from Melong Publications
(SECMOL). A limited number of copies is available directly from the author:
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