The originals

I don't know if you're aware but the only real way of eating momos that I know of is with a bowl of clear soup and momo chutney.

The first time I ever ate this delicious piece of soft flour wrapper encasing minced meat was when I was roughly 14 and had gone to watch a movie at 'Chanakya' movie hall as a sort of treat after a sports meet.
Chanakya complex, at that time of life was one of those most popular hangout's one had to be seen at.
There was a rather popular outlet for Nirula's there as well, in my memory it was always full of people and I often badgered my parents to treat me to an HCF. That's what we young ones and apparently cool ones called hot chocolate fudge, one of those mad things I could never get enough of.

It was at that time when a stall, more like a small open restaurant for momos got rather popular.
Now, momo being one of those rare unearthly items no one had ever much heard of let alone see and to me it looked like it had my name written all over.

Seeing my curiosity I was rather benevolently taken to the stall where I'd asked for chicken momos, and at that time in world, in our country, beef wasn't nearly as taboo..for the menu had pork, chicken, fish and beef momos.

After ordering one plate of momo's and being curiously drawn to big baskets being manned by rather dexterous cooks I was presented with the most gorgeously piquant smelling food.
It was a plate of typically classic chicken momos, served with a huge bowl of clear soup that was indeed clear; watery in consistency and adorned with a few flecks of green onions.

What on earth?
I hadn't seen much soups that were as watery, considering all soups in Chinese restaurants were thickened with a slurry of cornstarch, I ventured a taste and was immediately a convert.

The soup in question wasn't spicy, wasn't burgeoning with a hundred flavours, but in fact had a distinctly clean, palette cleansing quality to it, with earthy flavours that I later found out came from cooked pork and chicken bones.

Dear oh dear. The first bite into that soft, steamed momo flesh was a revelation and as a child who was being treated to a night of movie and dinner after a gruelling athletic competition I went on to not only eat another plate of those lovely dumplings but also drank two additional bowls of soup and got another plate packed for my wee brother whom I couldn't wait to share this fabulous delicacy with.

That day hence I made a weekly pilgrimage to Chanakya movie hall, that entire area thriving and alive with the most bizarre foods.. Russian, Mediterranean, Bhutanese.. and it was there that I ate momos of all varieties including fried and maybe died and went to heaven.

They were always always served with their fantastic clear soup and never have I ever had momos without the soup, which is why I felt rather pained at finding bastardised momo stalls crop up all over the city, serving momo's without the soup, in fact they didn't even know that soup was almost mandatory when served with these steamed dumplings.

Dilli Haat was another of those thankfully traditional places that always served clear soup with momo's and their versions were pretty decent too, though not nearly good enough to even come close to ones in Chanakya but still, not bad.

I've not eaten momo's for a while now, and I'm not sure if I even want to, seeing how they've lost the real essence of their creation in steady demise of their own popularity.
Ah, it pains me to see how they're being mass produced out of every second stall and look nothing like their forefathers.

How I long to eat proper momo's with a bowl of soup and red hot chutney.