Chomolungma restaurant in Canberra
Located in a little cobblestone lane in a suburb of Canberra is a Nepalese restaurant. I wanted to try eating there as I had not eaten Nepalese food before and as it was a friends birthday we decided to celebrate here.
It’s a quaint little restaurant which is quite nicely decorated inside. There was only one other couple dining when I arrived and when they left only one other arrived, so a quiet night for a Wednesday at this restaurant.
As their website says…Chomolungma is Tibetan and means ‘The Goddess Mother of Mountains’ and refers to Mount Everest. When my friend arrived, we ordered some Roti bread [which was pan fried and tossed with ghee] and a main course each. We decided not to share as my friend wanted to order a meat dish and of course I only eat vegetarian food.
We were given complimentary pappadams before our meal arrived which were great to suppress our hunger as neither of us had time for lunch that day. Then pretty much straight after that our meals arrived. I also ordered white rice and a mango pickle dish.
Our waitress told us that Nepalese food is influenced by the Tibetan cuisines from the North and Indian from the south which makes extensive use of spices like cumin, Himalayan pepper, chillies, garlic, coriander and many other spices. I must say with my meal I didn’t find there were enough spices and my friend said the same about her dish. My dish was the green beans, potatoes cooked with tomatoes, onion and garlic which was nice but I just thought it needed a bit of spice to liven it up.
My friend, the birthday girl ordered the beef with vindaloo sauce…
After our main courses were served, our waitress told us a little bit about the chef who was born in Nepal who when he was growing up had an interest in how his meals were prepared by his mother. This interest then led the chef to commence work in the hospitality industry in 1996 in Nepal and is now an expert in Nepali cuisine.
(photo courtesy of http://www.tripadvisor.com.au)
Something interesting I learnt about the restaurant is that if you order the Nepali Thali which is a meat or vegetarian meal made up of a selection of dishes, it comes in a tray with little dishes. Really Thali means a round platter used to serve food and that is exactly how the meal is served. The idea behind a Thali is to offer six different flavours of sweet, salt, bitter, sour, astringent and spicy on one single plate. The plates looked great. I wish I had ordered this!!
(two photos courtesy of http://www.mapsofindia.com)
Lovely night, probably would return just to try some other dishes, especially the Thali.
As were the views at night….
A lovely hour or so and well worth the time when in Beijing.
So…we are in our last day in Guizhou Province and we still have a few places to visit which means this post I am going to cover three different places and a lunch so hope it’s not too long to read.
Cone karst mountains are very similar to those found in Yangshuo in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (another amazing place in China). Both were created through the same process of slowly-dissolving limestone giving way to cone-shaped mini-mountains.
When we arrived at Wanfenglin, we took advantage of the safari buggies traveling along the high road which is about 100 metres above the valley floor, otherwise it’s a very long walk around the township. The predominant minority living here are the Buyi (布依), who are related to the Zhuang (壮) —the largest minority group in China.
Older architecture in the area is made from rough-cut local limestone with slate or tile roofs and our guide showed us the oldest home in the township. It’s a shame really that there are not many of the older homes left as they are wonderful to see but the traditional homes are being replaced by more modern country homes made with ceramic tiles.
Our next stop was to Dragon Palace Cave in Anshun where we took a walk alongside a little river before taking a little motorised boat into the caves. It is said that these caves are the home of the mythological Dragon King and got their name because of its resemblance to the Dragon King’s palace described in one of China’s most influential novels, ‘Journey to the West’.
We then hopped onto a little mortised boat and travelled into the mouth of the caves.
Our guide advised us that this is the longest underground river in China, some 5,000 metres long and flows beneath more than thirty hills connecting over ninety limestone caves. Inside there is a waterfall, along with stalactite and stalagmite formations which are lit up with different colours – it was pretty but probably not one of the best places I have visited in China.
We then knew we had to have lunch as were were very hungry so we stopped at a little shop with a wonderful Chinese woman who made us some noodles and dumplings; too much food but it was sensational.
Whilst the owner cooked our noodles we selected toppings including chilli/onions/beef (for my friends) and vinegar and my friend Jo went to look for some cold drinks; which she found and brought back for us. I asked for vegetarian dumplings and my friends had the meat – all made in front of us on a tiny little bench then popped into boiling water to cook.
Of course my eyes were bigger than my belly and I ended up giving my dumplings to our driver and tour guide; which they appreciated. And as we left we gave the owner a little furry koala as a gift which she told us she was going to give to her grandchild; another person who was very appreciative!!
After our lunch we had one more place to visit before going to the airport – Jiaxiu Tower in downtown Guiyang. We did not have much time but wanted to see the tower so the driver dropped us off up the road and we walked very quickly to the area where the tower is located and along the way saw locals selling different types of fruit and lovely blossoming trees.
Jiaxiu Tower is a landmark of Guiyang and is known as the First Scholar’s Tower. It was originally built in 1598 to encourage intellectuals to study for imperial examinations.
It’s a three-storey tower twenty-metres high. We didn’t, unfortunately, have time to go into the tower but it was lovely to see from outside.
Sue's Fabulous Travels 
You must be logged in to post a comment.