Chhurpi Soup

Ingredients:
Chhurpi – 250 gms
Tomato – 1/2 cup, sliced
Onion – 1/2 cup, chopped
Green chillies – 3 to 4, sliced
Ginger – 1 tbsp, grated
Paanch phoran – 1/2 tbsp
Turmeric powder – 1/4 tbsp
Salt – 1 tsp

Method:
1. Fry paanch phoran spices in hot oil. Add chopped onions and fry further till it becomes golden brown.
2. Add chhurpi to finely grated ginger, tomatoes and salt. Stir and fry till oil separates.
3. Garnish with fresh coriander leaves.
4. Serve hot.

Chhurpi is a dried smoked cheese eaten in the Eastern Himalayas. Chhurpi is made from the milk of a yak or chauri (a hybrid of yak and cattle). Both types are hard. It is prepared in a local dairy or at home from a material extracted out of buttermilk called sergem . The sergem is wrapped in cloth, usually jute bags, and pressed hard to get rid of water. Then, it dries out and becomes similar to cheese. Finally, in this cheese-like stage; it is cut into pieces, and hung over the smoke to make it stone hard.