Food · Lukla
A Sherpa breakfast of riki kur and butter tea
Order riki kur, the Sherpa potato pancake, with butter and somar cheese, and a bowl of salty butter tea before your first day on the trail. It is the breakfast Sherpa families eat, and it explains why potatoes matter so much in Khumbu.
Potatoes reached Khumbu in the 1800s and changed it. At these altitudes, where barley and buckwheat yield little, potatoes grow well, store through winter and fed far more people than the old grains. They still fill Sherpa kitchens in a dozen forms, and the best known is riki kur: raw potato grated by hand on a stone or tin grater, mixed with a little salt and fried as a thick pancake on a flat iron pan.
It is eaten hot with a smear of butter or with somar, a sour, pungent fermented cheese that takes some getting used to. Alongside it comes solja, Tibetan-style butter tea, churned with salt and butter. To a newcomer the tea tastes more like soup than tea; to a Sherpa grandmother it is how the day begins, and it helps against cold and dry air.
Most Lukla lodges will make riki kur if you ask the night before, since grating takes time. Some keep a hand-grater for the purpose. Pair it with a boiled egg and a cup of milk tea if butter tea is too much. On the way out, after two weeks of noodles, it is the dish many of our travellers ask to have again.
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Questions
What is riki kur?
Riki kur is a traditional Sherpa pancake made from grated raw potato, salted and fried on a flat pan until crisp outside and soft inside. It is eaten with butter or with somar, a fermented cheese spread. It is common in Khumbu and Solu homes and on some lodge menus, usually as breakfast or a filling afternoon meal.
What does Sherpa butter tea taste like?
Salty and rich, closer to a thin soup than to sweet tea. It is made by churning black tea with butter and salt, traditionally in a wooden cylinder. Sherpas drink many cups a day, and hosts refill your cup the moment it drops. Sip slowly, and leave it full when you have had enough, as an empty cup gets refilled.
Is lodge food safe to eat in Lukla?
Generally yes, if you choose freshly cooked hot food such as dal bhat, riki kur, soups and noodles. Avoid salads and untreated water, and use purification tablets or a filter for refills rather than buying plastic bottles. Meat is carried up from lower valleys without refrigeration, so many trekkers stay vegetarian above Lukla; we suggest it.
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