Sel Roti and the Festival Table: What Nepal Eats to Celebrate

Every culture has foods that appear only when there is something to celebrate. In Nepal, the surest sign that a festival is near is the smell of rice batter hitting hot oil. Sel roti, a crisp, slightly sweet ring of fried bread, is made in almost every Hindu household for the great autumn festivals, and many other dishes are attached to specific dates in the calendar.

What sel roti is

Picture a thin, uneven hoop about the size of a bangle or a little larger, reddish-brown and crunchy on the outside, soft and chewy within. It is made from rice, not wheat, and falls somewhere between a doughnut and a bagel in appearance, though it is lighter and less sweet than either.

How it is made

1. Soak. Rice is washed and soaked in water overnight.

2. Grind. The drained rice is pounded or ground into a coarse, slightly gritty flour. Traditionally this was done in a large wooden mortar; today most families use an electric grinder.

3. Mix. The flour is combined with sugar, ghee or butter, and sometimes mashed ripe banana, cardamom, cloves or a little milk, and beaten into a thick, pourable batter. It is left to rest for some hours.

4. Fry. Oil or ghee is heated in a wide pan. The cook takes batter in a cupped hand, or uses a bottle or cup with a hole, and pours it in a continuous circle into the oil. The ring puffs and floats. It is turned once with a thin stick and lifted out when deep golden.

Getting an even, unbroken circle takes practice. In many families it is the grandmother's job, and learning it is a small rite of passage.

Sel roti keeps for a week or more without refrigeration, which is why it is made in large quantities, sent to relatives and offered to visitors throughout the holidays.

When it is eaten

• Tihar, the festival of lights in late October or November, is the main occasion. Sisters prepare sel roti for their brothers on the final day, and stacks of it are placed among the offerings.

• Dashain, the longest festival of the year, a few weeks earlier.

• Weddings and other family ceremonies.

• Maghe Sankranti in mid-January.

Outside festival time, you can find it at street stalls and tea shops, especially in the early morning, where it is eaten for breakfast with tea, spiced potato curry or yoghurt.

Other foods of the festival calendar

Dashain: meat and beaten rice. Families who can afford it slaughter a goat, and the days are filled with goat curry served with chiura, flattened rice. For many households it is the one time of year when meat is eaten freely.

Tihar: sweets. Alongside sel roti come anarsa, small rice-flour cakes coated with poppy or sesame seeds; fini roti, a flaky layered pastry; and trays of milk sweets given to brothers and guests.

Maghe Sankranti: winter warmers. On the first day of the month of Magh, in mid-January, people eat foods believed to give strength in the cold: sesame-seed balls bound with molasses, hard toffee-like sugar candy, boiled yam and sweet potato, ghee, and a rice and lentil porridge.

Janai Purnima: nine-bean soup. On the August full moon, households in the Kathmandu Valley and beyond cook kwati, a thick soup of nine kinds of sprouted beans, said to restore the body after the hard work of rice planting.

Teej: the feast before the fast. The evening before women undertake a day-long fast in late summer, they gather for a rich meal called dar, featuring rice pudding, sweets, fried breads and curries.

Losar: fried biscuits. For the Tibetan and Sherpa new year in late winter, families fry twisted pastries called khapse and stack them on the household altar.

Trying festival foods as a visitor

• If you are in Nepal during a festival, a homestay is the best way to taste these dishes and to see them made.

• Sweet shops in every town display seasonal specialities in the days before a holiday. Ask what is being made for the occasion.

• When invited to a home, you will be given a plate whether or not you are hungry. Eat what you can and praise the cook.

More than a snack

Sel roti is tied to the idea of people coming back together. Its ring shape, the days of preparation and the way it is carried to relatives' houses all belong to a season when Nepalis travel long distances to be with family. Bite into one, still warm, at a roadside stall on a cold morning, and you are tasting what home means to a great many people.