How to Make Tea Momos [This entry goes out to Becca]

Often in this blog I have praised cheese momos, a Bhutanese dish somewhat like perogis. Today our good friends Dawa Dema and Jimmie taught us to prepare a related dish called tea momos. The closest Canadian equivalent to tea momos are not perogis but my Aunt Leela's famous "dough boys." Like dough boys, tea momos are served with thin beef stew. Note: here stew is called "curry" even when it does not contain any of the spices that Canadians think of as curry spices.

To prepare authentic Bhutanese tea momos the authentic Bhutanese way, begin by moving your cooking utensils from the counter to floor. Sit cross-legged and gather your friends and family. Forget the idea that "too many cooks spoil the broth"; this is a social activity:

Place a heap of flour in a mixing bowl:

Add baking powder, about one big spoonful of it for each big bowlful of flour:

Add water and mix by hand. If ever it is uncomfortably sticky, add more flour: 

Knead until it feels like pizza dough:

Break off enough to roll into the size and shape of a snooker ball:

Get out your rolling pin and your adorable little wooden table with stub legs:

Roll the snooker ball until it is about the thickness of a loonie and just less than the area of your adorable table: 

Fold the far end toward you such that about 2 cm is doubled over:

Flip the whole thing over. Take the same section of dough that you have just folded and fold it again, this time away from you. Repeat this process for the entire length of the dough. The end result should be one long shape made thick with folding:

Now twist the long piece. I find it helpful to sing the dance hit from Love Aaj Kal:

"And we twist and we twist and we twist and we twist...":

Now tie it into a knot:

It may not be as easy as it looks:

Place your creation on a steaming tray. Make many more. Steam for fifteen minutes. The coolest cookware is designed so that your steam tray attaches to the top of your soup pot. That way, boiling your curry cooks the momos that go with them. 

To eat your momos, tear off a piece and dip it in your curry:

They are absolutely lovely: