What to Eat in Lachung Today?

Meals come with the room

Most North Sikkim packages include dinner and breakfast at your hotel, and breakfast is often packed or eaten early because of the dawn start. Hotel menus lean on rice, dal, a vegetable, noodles and chicken, cooked mild for visitors. Ask for the local dishes by name; kitchens will often make them if asked in advance.

Soups for the cold

Thukpa is a Tibetan noodle soup with vegetables and meat, and it is what most people want after a morning in the snow. Gundruk soup is made from fermented, dried leafy greens. It tastes sour and earthy, and it is a staple of Nepali and Sikkimese home cooking.

Momos

Steamed dumplings filled with pork, chicken or vegetables, served with a hot tomato and chilli chutney. Momos are eaten at any hour here. Pork momos are the most local; vegetarian ones are easy to find.

Bhutia dishes

Phagshapa is a Bhutia dish of pork fat and belly cooked with radish and dried chillies. It is rich rather than hot. Try it in a homestay or ask your hotel kitchen, as it is not always on the menu.

Breakfast and snacks

Sel roti is a ring of sweet rice-flour batter, fried until crisp outside and soft inside. It is made for Dashain and Tihar but turns up at breakfast too. At Yumthang and Zero Point, small stalls sell tea, coffee, instant noodles and snacks; there is little else to eat up there.

Eating at altitude

Eat a light breakfast before the Yumthang drive and drink plenty of water; heavy meals and alcohol make altitude harder. Tap water is not safe to drink untreated, but hotels provide filtered water, and packaged water in plastic bottles is not sold in the village. See where to eat for the kitchens listed here.