country Essentials · 7 foods
Bhutan Essentials
A considered first route through Bhutan: the foods that carry its everyday habits, celebrations, ingredients, and memory.
Explore all Bhutan foods →THE
ESSENTIALS
The complete shortlist
7 foods to know.
Each selection includes the reason it belongs here—so this is a guide, not just a pile of names.
Bhutan
Ema Datshi
ཨེ་མ་དར་ཚིལ།
Chillies cooked as the vegetable, not a garnish, in a loose sauce of Bhutanese curd cheese.
Bhutan
Phaksha Paa
ཕག་ཤ་པ།
Fatty pork cooked with dried red chilli and radish into a concentrated everyday Bhutanese dish.
Paro, Bhutan
Bhutanese Red Rice
ཟླུམ་འབྲས།
Paro-grown short-grain rice that cooks rose-pink, nutty and slightly chewy.
Bhutan
Ezay
ཨེ་ཙེ།
The fresh or cooked chilli relish found beside nearly every Bhutanese meal, varying from house to house.
Bhutan
Suja
ཇ་སྲུབ་མ།
Brick tea churned with butter and salt, poured hot and refilled as hospitality.
Haa, Bhutan
Hoentay
ཧོན་ཏེ།
Haa buckwheat dumplings filled with turnip greens and cheese for the valley's New Year tradition.
Bhutan
Ara
ཨ་རག
Home-distilled grain spirit served warm or plain, sometimes enriched with butter and egg.