“Thukpa is what people reach for when they are sick, or cold, or missing something they cannot name”

Born in Dhondenling, a Tibetan settlement at the foot of Karnataka’s Biligiriranga Hills, Passang Dolma has grown up eating thukpa at home. At 27, she has never been to Tibet, like most of the people she cooks for. Established in 1974 with support from the Government of India and Karnataka, Dhondenling has housed refugees who fled Tibet after the Chinese occupation, including Passang’s grandparents. 

On a weekend afternoon, I find Passang in the kitchen of Dear Cafe, an eatery serving “authentic” Tibetan fare that she and her three siblings have run since 2025. While her grandparents grew ragi, maize, and potatoes, a social media-driven influx of tourists brought a new source of livelihood for the young generation. 

Passang starts her workday at 11 am by preparing beef broth for the thukpa, the meat sourced from Kollegal. “In Tibet, it would have been yak,” she says. “There, yak supplies most of the milk and about half the meat. Here, beef is the closest substitute.” Thukpa requires fresh celery and peppers, which come from nearby villages, and hand-pulled noodles that Passang makes. The simmering broth is the most time-consuming: chicken cooks for 20 minutes, beef for 40. What is missing is chhurpi—a hard, salty, and deeply savoury cheese Passang has only tasted once—which lends depth to the dish but is impossible to source. 

On weekdays, the customers are mostly monks from nearby monasteries, while on weekends the tables fill with tourists from Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Bengaluru; Passang cooks until nearly 9 pm. The younger ones like spicy food and many order chowmein over thukpa. “We try to keep it authentic,” she says, “but we adjust.” 

She would like to visit Tibet one day, but not to live or work. “The freedom I have [here] might not be there,” she says, “and getting there is difficult in any case.” When she calls thukpa a part of her home, she means how her family prepares it: boiled meat and vegetables, salt and pepper, a dried red chili chutney as garnish. She shares, “Thukpa is what people reach for when they are sick, or cold, or missing something they cannot name.”