Tibetan Tsampa

Tsampa – Brief Introduction

Tsampa is main food of Tibetans who will have Tsampa in every meal. In fact, Tsampa is chow mein which made up from barley. It is similar with the chow mein in north area which is grinded first and then fried, while Tsampa is fried and then grinded with the peel together.

Tsampa is Tibetan food. As for most Qinghai Province are in Tibetan area, it is common that people in Qinghai Province have Tsampa. The main raw material of Tsampa is barley which is first fried and grinded, and then adds some butter into it. The way of making Tsampa: first let butter melt in hot milk tea; then add moderate barley flour into it, and stir it into the form of pellets; at last, use hands to make it into some shapes and eat. During making Tsampa, the butter should be more and milk tea should be less, then the Tsampa will be more delicious. When you taste Tsampa, you can first feel its fragrance which is similar with the taste of fried soybean flour. Then, you will feel the barley flour is a little thick, you can feel the grains of barley. Tibetans created Tsampa for it is easy to carry, and you can eat while you making it.

Tsampa – Recipe

Tsampa is a kind of main food in Tibetan. First, dried and fried barley, grind the barley into flour with the peel together. Then put the barley flour into a bowl, add some butter tea and water into it and stir it continuously until it can be pinched into pellets. Tsampa is easy to carry, suitable for pasturing life. When Tibetans go out, they only take a wooden bowl, with a "tanggu" (a pocket to carry Tsampa) on waist and a little tea. It will be fine to add some meat, vegetables into Tsampa and make it into "porridge" ("Tuba" in Tibetan language).

Tsampa – Custom

In the New Year's Day in Tibetan calendar, all the Tibetan families will put an auspicious wooden bucket which is named "zusuokima" on Tibetan cupboard, with barley, Zaoji and Drolma (Solanum muricatum) it in and stick barley tassels, Huajiao ears and a Caipi Cwith sun, moon and star designs on it which is named "Zhizhuo". When neighbors or relatives visit, the host will present the "zusuokima", the customer should pick up a little Tsampa and throw into sky for three times and then pick up a little and put into mouth and say:" tashi delek" (everything goes well) to express blessing.