How-To Guide for Losar — Tibetan New Year [Updated for 2023]

Khapse Recipe: How to Make Tibetan Losar Pastries
Lobsang Wangdu teaches you how to make the most common and simple Losar khapse, called nyapsha. With video.

Open your Generous Heart: Create a Losar Shrine
In Tibetan homes the Losar altar serves as a prominent, central symbol of a wish to cultivate a generous heart and to invoke beautiful blessings into the lives of our family, friends and community for the New

Khapse Recipes: Bulug
As part of a series on the traditions of Losar, Tibetan New Year, here is a recipe for bulug, which is a fairly fancy type of the new year pastries collectively called khapse.

Tibetan Butter Sculptures — Tsepdro — for Losar
The making of tsepdro — the kind of Tibetan butter sculpture commonly created at Losar (Tibetan New Year)

Insider’s Guide to Losar Eating
An introduction to Tibetan New Year food traditions leading up to Losar, including preparing Losar pastries called khapse, the Eve of New Year’s Eve soup called guthuk, and the chemar bo.

Vegetarian Guthuk Recipe
Warm, wonderful, hearty veg version of the recipe for the popular guthuk noodle soup traditionally eaten at the end of the year.

Changkol: To Start Losar Morning off Right
Try some changkol, as Tibetans do, for the first dish you eat on the first day of Losar, Tibetan New Year.

Nyi-shu-Gu Traditions: The Eve of New Year’s Eve
Rituals for purifying your home and body in the closing days of the old year, including the fun guthuk noodle soup, and the lue, the effigy that symbolizes all the negativity we want to be rid of.

Dresil Recipe: Easy Tibetan Sweet Rice
Learn an easy, authentic recipe for the Tibetan sweet rice served at Losar and other special occasions.

Tibetan Chang: How to Make Rice Beer
Kelsang shows you, with a video, an authentic, easy recipe for drechang, Tibetan rice beer.

Tsampa: It Doesn’t Get More Tibetan Than This!
An introduction to the most uniquely Tibetan food, tsampa. At Losar, we use tsampa for the chemar bo, for the changkol (khapse and chang dish which we will post about shortly), and to eat on the first day of Losar.

Butter Tea – Recipe to Make Your Own Tibetan Tea (Po Cha)
Modern version of a traditional Tibetan tea recipe by Lobsang Wangdu. Tibetans traditionally drink a bunch of po cha during Losar, though that isn’t exactly special, since they drink po cha all the time anyway.

Thue: An Original Tibetan Treat
Learn how to make thue, a sweet, cheesy, buttery treat often eaten at Losar and other special occasions.

Momos — Recipe for Tibetan Dumplings
The most well-known and beloved of Tibetan dishes, momos are popular at Losar parties, though traditionally we do not eat them on the first day of Losar, as the closed shape is considered inauspicious for that day.