ChingTam Soibum - Fermented Bamboo Shoot, 250 g

Fermented sliced Bamboo shoots, popularly known in Manipur as Soibum, form an integral part of the local cuisines of northeast India. Soibum is the fermented thin slices of the inner part of young bamboo shoot. It can be kept for a long time and tastes better with age. Due to the rich source of health-enhancing bioactive compounds, soibum is considered a healthy food and consumed widely in the northeastern regions, with each state having a unique style of preparing the fermented bamboo shoots. Soibum is considered as one of the useful health foods because of their rich contents of proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, fibres, and minerals and very low fat. Though bamboo shoots provide lots of health benefits, their consumption is confined mostly to Southeast Asian and East Asian countries. The acceptability of bamboo shoots as the popular vegetable crop is limited as the season is very short. The bamboo shoots are therefore preserved using various methods but the fermenting process is the most common one. However, the fermented sliced bamboo is not very popular as yet to their high pungent smell and bitter acidic taste, but once the taste is acquired people crave for it.