Food coma: Hot, steaming momos are comfort and reward rolled into one

Dumplings are proof that most cultures agree on at least one thing: dough plus filling works. Thin layers of dough, generous fillings – sweet or savoury – sometimes steamed, sometimes fried. For me, the Tibetan momo takes the top spot. Always steamed, never fried and only with meat. On a good day or a terrible one, it is always momo time.

They look deceptively simple, but a good momo demands finesse: wrappers thin enough to be translucent, filling juicy enough to drip into the spoon and absolutely no unholy additions of cabbage.

Over the years, I’ve lived in enough cities to develop what I like to think of as a momo map – from roadside shops, stalls at Dilli Haat and easy-to-miss restaurants in Delhi, to nondescript hill shacks in Kalimpong serving them with a mean peanut chutney, and a corner shop in Bandra that I stumbled upon during college after navigating alleys I’d never been down before.

During the pandemic, I even tried making them at home. With my mum’s help, we like to think we’ve finally nailed a chicken momo recipe that tastes like all our nights in the hill towns.

Which is why my four years in Kochi were truly a test for a momo lover like me. No matter how earnestly friends took me to their favourite spots, those momos never quite landed. When I moved back to Delhi in the middle of a heatwave in May 2024, my first order of business – before unpacking or setting up my room – was to order a plate of momos.

I realised how long this love has endured during a visit to Kalimpong in 2019, nearly a decade after I’d left. In just two days, I ate more momos than advisable. When I ran into someone who used to help us cook at home, she insisted on quickly making chicken momo and soup, certain that some things would never change. And she was spot on.

Now, living alone in Delhi, I have a go-to roadside shop right next to work that I return to after bad days or to mark small victories of adulthood. Mutton, chicken, sometimes mushroom – my rare vegetarian exception. A plate of momos, hot and steaming, is comfort and reward rolled into one. And inevitably, it ends in a very happy food coma.