Tsampa
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| Type | Porridge |
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| Place of origin | Tibet, Nepal |
| Main ingredients | Flour (usually barley) |
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Tsampa or Tsamba (Tibetan: རྩམ་པ་, Wylie: rtsam pa; Nepali: साम्पा; Chinese: 糌粑; pinyin: zānbā) is a Tibetan and Himalayan Nepalese staple foodstuff, particularly prominent in the central part of the region. It is roasted flour, usually barley flour and sometimes also wheat flour. It is usually mixed with the salty Tibetan butter tea.
Tsampa is quite simple to prepare; indeed, it is known as a convenience food and often used by the Sherpas, nomads, and other travelers. While traditional tsampa is prepared with tea, water or beer is sometimes used in its place. It may also be prepared as a porridge. André Migot described its preparation:
You leave a little buttered tea in the bottom of your bowl and put a big dollop of tsampa on top of it. You stir gently with the forefinger, then knead with the hand, meanwhile twisting your bowl round and round until you finish up with a large dumplinglike object which you proceed to ingest, washing it down with more tea. The whole operation demands a high degree of manual dexterity, and you need a certain amount of practical experience before you can judge correctly how much tsampa goes with how much tea. Until you get these proportions right the end product is apt to turn into either a lump of desiccated dough or else a semiliquid paste which sticks to your fingers. Sometimes you lace this preparation with a form of powdered milk, made from curds which have been dried in the sun.
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