Tama

The most distinctly Sikkimese vegetable dish — fermented bamboo shoots (tama) cooked with black-eyed peas (bodi) and potato in a thin, sour, earthy broth seasoned with turmeric, dried red chilli, and fenugreek seeds. The fermented bamboo shoot is the defining ingredient; it has a funky, intensely sour character that develops during the fermentation and gives the curry its unmistakable flavour. Tama-bodi is the Sikkimese dish most visitors find revelatory or challenging, depending on their relationship with fermented foods. Eaten with steamed rice; the sour bamboo broth poured over rice is a complete comfort meal for Sikkimese households through the monsoon months when fresh bamboo is fermented for the year.