Tongba

Warm millet beer served in a bamboo vessel — fermented finger millet (kodo) packed into a tall cylindrical bamboo or wooden container (the tongba vessel), hot water poured over the fermented millet, and the resulting mildly alcoholic, sweet-sour, slightly opaque liquid drunk through a bamboo straw fitted with a strainer at the tip. More water is added repeatedly as the liquid is consumed; a single vessel of millet can be refreshed six to eight times before the millet is exhausted. Drunk communally, passed around the family or gathering; the warmth of the drink and the mild, gradual intoxication make tongba the ideal Himalayan winter social drink. Found across Sikkim, Darjeeling, and the Tibetan Himalayan belt.