This is the first picture I ever took of Yeshi. He didn’t know I was taking it, but I wasn’t entirely stalking him either. We had met a few hours before on a mountain path in the foothills of the Indian Himalayas.
Yeshi was a Tibetan refugee. He’d been living in India for ten years and was studying English and photography in Dharamsala at the time. I was a tourist with a few days to spare in his adopted home town.
We’d never have met if it wasn’t for the monkeys. Not the cheeky, pickpocketing ones you find everywhere in India, but large, leaf-eating langurs. Yeshi calls them snow monkeys.
Snow monkeys move around according to the season. In winter, when leaves, fruits and flowers become scarce at high altitude they descend into the town, feeding off bark, buds and plant stems.
Here are the very monkeys that got us into conversation. Knowing them to be shy creatures, Yeshi went in with his camera for a close-up. Looking for a better shot myself, I followed him.
Now many of you know Yeshi to be a big guy hardly lacking in swagger: he’s the self-styled King of Dharamsala. But let’s be clear – what really sold me was his food.
That evening, after he’d guided me around the scenic, circular trail that loops around His Holiness XIV Dalai Lama’s temple, he cooked me dinner.
On the menu was beef thenthuk. This was my first time savouring the hand-pulled noodles that have since become a staple in our family home. I didn’t know then the story of how he’d learned to cook this dish in the yak-hair tent that his family lived in on the grasslands during summertime.
But I did know that I could slurp this soup forever, and that made this man a keeper.
This weekend the kitchen team at St. Catherine’s College in Oxford are cooking up beef thenthuk for two hundred participants of the Oxford Food Symposium, the oldest-established and most respected conference of its kind.
As guest chefs, Yeshi and I are overseeing the lunch. We’re incredibly proud to showcase Tibetan food on such a prestigious stage. As far as we’re aware, this is the first time the cuisine has ever had such a grand billing.
Taking thenthuk out of the yak-hair tent and into Oxford’s largest college is a spectacular full-circle moment for us. It’s also timely. Tibet needs representation more than ever right now. We’re here to serve.
IMPORTANT NOTICE! The restaurant will be open for two more weekends before our regular summer closure. This week’s opening hours are as follows:
Fri: 5-9.30pm (dinner only)
Saturday: 21-3/ 5-9.30pm
Sunday: 12-3 / 5-9pm
Our menu is up on the website – check it. Come for dine in or take away. We also have excellent stocks of sepen chilli oil and freezer food, so make sure you come in and load up before doors close.
Oh, and iced chai will be back. If you’re a newsletter subscriber we’re actually gifting it to you this week. Click here to sign up.
Looking forward to seeing you soon,
Julie and Yeshi
Opening hours this week:
Weds – Fri: 5-9.30pm
Saturday: 12-3pm 🥢 5-9.30pm
Sunday: 12-3pm 🥢 5-9pm
☏ 01865 499318
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