What to Eat in the Dooars: Boroli, Shidol and Momos

A kitchen of four peoples

The Dooars have no single cuisine, and that is the pleasure of eating here. The plains belong to Rajbanshi farmers, whose cooking leans on rice, river fish, leafy greens and fermented fish. Bengali families from the south brought fish curries in mustard, posto and sweets. Nepali families in Samsing, Jhalong, Bindu and the garden hills cook momos, thukpa and fermented greens. And the tea garden communities descended from Chota Nagpur families cook simple rice-and-greens meals and brew rice beer for festivals.

In practice, a homestay in Lataguri might serve you dal, rice, fried greens and a mustard fish curry; a dhaba on the highway at Chalsa will offer a Bengali thali and chow mein; a homestay in Samsing will make momos on request; and a Dukpa family in Buxa will cook rice, dal and vegetables from the slope behind the house. Eat where you sleep at least once a day. Homestay meals are usually the best food in the Dooars, and they are included in the ₹1,200–2,000 per person rate.

Siliguri, where most trips begin and end, is the place to fill the gaps. Its markets and bus stand lanes have Bengali sweet shops selling rasgulla, sandesh and mishti doi, Marwari snack counters, Tibetan and Nepali momo kitchens and cheap rice hotels serving fish and veg thalis to traders. A night there before an early train east is a good chance to eat a proper Bengali meal for ₹150–250.

River fish: boroli and friends

The Teesta, Torsa, Jaldhaka and their tributaries supply the fish that matters most here. The prize is boroli, a small, silvery river fish that north Bengal people speak of with real affection. It is at its best in winter, when the rivers run low and clear. Cooks fry it whole until crisp, or make a light jhol, a thin curry with mustard paste, green chilli and turmeric, eaten with rice. Ask for it by name at dhabas around Lataguri, Malbazar and Jalpaiguri, and expect to pay more than for farmed fish.

Other dishes you will meet are rohu and katla curries in mustard or tomato gravy, small fish fried with onion, and tangra in a thin, peppery gravy. In the haats, the weekly village markets, look for shutki, sun-dried fish, sold in heaps and smelled from twenty metres away. River fish catches change with the season and the floods, and boroli is not always available; ask what came in that morning.

Rajbanshi dishes: shidol and pelka

Rajbanshi cooking is the oldest kitchen of the Dooars plains and the least seen by visitors, because it lives in homes rather than restaurants. Two dishes are worth asking for.

Shidol is a fermented fish preparation: small fish, typically puti, dried and pounded with the stems of arum or similar plants, shaped into cakes and kept in earthen pots to ferment. A little shidol is roasted or fried and mashed with garlic, chilli and onion into a pungent chutney eaten with rice. It is strong, salty and an acquired taste. Pelka is a dish of leafy greens, often jute leaves, cooked with chheka, an alkaline water traditionally made by filtering through ash, which softens the leaves and gives a slightly slippery, soupy texture.

Few dhabas cook these. Ask your homestay host if a Rajbanshi family nearby could make them, or look for food stalls at fairs such as the Jalpesh mela near Maynaguri around Shivaratri. Be patient with the strength of shidol; locals start children on a very small amount.

Hill kitchens and garden lines

Up the side valleys, at Samsing, Suntalekhola, Jhalong and Bindu, the food turns Nepali. Momos come steamed or fried with chicken, pork or vegetables and a fierce tomato and chilli achar. Thukpa, a noodle soup, is the cheap supper of cool evenings. Ask homestay hosts for gundruk, fermented and dried leafy greens cooked into a sour soup, and kinema, fermented soybeans fried with onion and chilli. Sel roti, a ring of sweet rice-flour batter fried in oil, appears at festivals and on cold mornings with tea.

In the tea garden areas, families descended from Oraon, Munda and other Chota Nagpur peoples cook rice with dal, seasonal greens gathered from the garden edges and field margins, and occasionally pork or chicken for celebrations. Handia, a home-brewed rice beer, is made for festivals such as Karam in Bhadra. It is a household and community drink, not something to buy in a bottle; if you are offered a cup at a festival, it is a gesture of welcome.

Near the Bhutan border, especially in Jaigaon opposite Phuentsholing, small restaurants serve Bhutanese food: ema datshi, chillies cooked in cheese, red rice and buckwheat noodles.

What a meal costs

These are indicative 2025–26 prices at ordinary dhabas, cafes and stalls, not resort restaurants, which charge two to three times as much.

Eating well without overspending

Food is one of the easier places to save money in the Dooars, and the cheap choices are usually the tastier ones.

• Choose a homestay with meals included rather than a room-only resort; you will eat better and spend half as much.
• Eat lunch at the busiest dhaba on the highway, where the fish is fresh because it sells out by 2 pm.
• On safari days, ask your host for a packed breakfast of puri, eggs or bread before the 6 am slot, and eat properly afterwards.
• Order fish by the piece; dhabas price boroli and large fish per plate or per piece, so ask before you order.
• Carry water and biscuits on long transfers; forest stretches between Chalsa and Nagrakata, and around Buxa and Jayanti, have few shops.
• Buy fruit at haats and bazaars rather than at tourist stalls near the park gates, where prices are higher.

Tea, fruit and the weekly haat

The Dooars grow tea by the tonne, almost all of it CTC, the crush, tear and curl method that makes the strong, quick-brewing leaf behind India's milky chai. A stall glass costs ₹10–20, boiled with milk and sugar. Some garden shops sell packets of local CTC; carry a few home for the taste of the plains.

Areca palms stand around nearly every village house, and betel nut with paan leaf is chewed everywhere. Pineapples come from the farms around Bidhannagar near Siliguri in summer; jackfruit and lychees ripen in May and June. In winter, look for oranges brought down from the hills, and fresh greens of every kind.

The best place to see all this is a haat, the weekly market held on a fixed day in each area. Rajbanshi farmers bring vegetables and fish, garden families buy rice and cloth, traders from the hills sell oranges and ginger, and the tea stalls run all day. Ask your host which day the nearest haat falls on. Go in the morning, carry small notes, and ask before you photograph sellers.