Manipuri cuisine

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Manipuri cuisine is simple, organic and healthy. Dishes are typically spicy foods that use chili pepper rather than Garam masala .

Basic Diet

The staple diet of Manipur consists of rice, leafy vegetables, and fish.^[1] Manipuris typically raise vegetables in a kitchen garden and rear fish in small ponds around their house. Since the vegetables are either grown at home or obtained from local markets, the cuisine is very seasonal, each season having its own special vegetables and preparations. The taste is very different from mainland Indian cuisines because of the use of various aromatic herbs and roots that are peculiar to the region ^[2] eg. maroi namakpi, maroi nakuppi, awa phadigom, mayang-ton, toning-khok etc. Further, many of the vegetable that are used in daily meals are found only in and around the region and not seen elsewhere. Some of these include yendem (a kind of taro), chawai, hawai mana, Koukha (a herb root), loklei, pulei, komprek etc. Various mushrooms also form an important part of the cuisine. These include uyen (similar to shittake mushroom), uchi-na (black slimy mushroom), chengum, kanglayen (lichen). There are also ingredients in the cuisine that require an acquired taste, such as hawaijar (fermented soya bean, somewhat similar to the Japanese Natto), soibum (fermented bamboo shoot) and ngari (fermented fish).

Sample Dishes

Eromba is a stew of boiled vegetables or potatoes with a lot of red chillies, tomatoes (optional) and dried fish salted to taste. It is garnished with chopped onions and coriander leaves.

Singju is a salad prepared with finely chopped cabbage, onions, lotus stems, tree beans, coriander leaves, and ginger. Boiled kidney beans are optional and the dish is seasoned with red chilli flakes, salted to taste, with red roasted sesame powder and roasted chick peas powder.

Chamthong is a boiled preparation of any seasonal vegetables with coarsely chopped onions, ginger and 2-4 garlic cloves and salt, topped with dry fish, fried fish pieces (optional)and water. It's soupy in nature and is eaten with rice.

Morok metpa is a coarse-paste prepared with green or dry red chilies. The chillies should be boiled with dry fish in a pan and then it should be mashed with salt; fried fish pieces can also be added to it. chopped onions and coriander leaves should be added to it and mixed. Other dishes are- kang-hou (various vegetables fried dry in oil with traditional spices), paknam (fish cake), nga-thongba (fish curry), ooti, pakora thongba, chagem pomba, keli chana, alu kangmet (boiled potato mashed with fried red chilli and salt and dressed with mustard oil), sana thongba which is prepared with paneer in Manipuri style, a-nganba (steam vegetables, such as pumpkin, sweet pea, carrots, French beans etc.).

References

1. ^ "Cuisines of North East India". http://www.north-east-india.com/information/cuisines.html. 
2. ^ "some fruits and foods of Manipur". http://www.mbobo.net/food-vegetable-manipur.html.