What Do the Mosuo Eat and Wear? Local Food and Dress Guide

Beyond the scenery, many visitors to Lugu Lake are also curious: what do the Mosuo eat and wear day to day? This article explains Mosuo food and dress.

What the Mosuo eat

Staples: corn and potatoes. Lugu Lake's altitude allows only cold-hardy crops. Corn and potatoes have been the Mosuo staple for hundreds of years.

Meat: pig-belly meat. This is the most distinctive Mosuo food. A whole pig is deboned, cured into a long slab and hung over the hearth to smoke. It keeps for years; to serve, cut a slice and steam or fry it. Pig-belly meat is the dish the Mosuo use to honour honoured guests.

Dairy: butter tea and yoghurt. The Mosuo drink butter tea, similar to the Tibetans. Yoghurt is homemade, very sour, eaten with honey.

Vegetables: few. The high altitude limits variety – mainly potatoes, cabbage and turnips, plus some wild greens in summer.

Fish: no longer available from Lugu Lake. Like the rest of the Yangtze basin, Lugu Lake enforces a ten-year fishing ban. Endemic fish such as schizothorax (split-belly carp) and carp may not be caught, and restaurant menus may not show "Lugu Lake fish" or "lake fish". The fish diners eat today are farmed fish brought in from outside. Three native species, including the thick-lipped schizothorax, are being bred for protection and are not yet open to fishing.

What the Mosuo drink

Butter tea. The daily drink, like the Tibetans'. Butter, brick tea and salt are beaten together. A bowl in the morning warms the body.

Guangdang liquor. The Mosuo's own distilled white liquor, made from corn, about 30% alcohol. The name "Guangdang" comes from the "guangdang" sound the bowl makes.

Sulima wine. The Mosuo sweet wine, brewed from highland barley, very low in alcohol – about 10%, like beer. Women and children can drink it.

What the Mosuo wear

Daily dress: much like Han Chinese. Mosuo people today wear T-shirts, jeans and trainers – no different from any city.

Traditional dress: pleated skirts and gold-trimmed hats. Mosuo women's traditional dress is the pleated skirt – long, with many folds, flaring nicely when walking. On top is a side-buttoned jacket, over which a sheepskin cape is draped, with a gold-trimmed hat on the head.

Men's traditional dress: short coat, long trousers, head wrap. Mosuo men's traditional dress resembles the Tibetan – a short coat, long trousers and a wrapped headcloth. Now only the elderly still wear it.

When is traditional dress worn? Not only at festivals. Mosuo women who run guesthouses and receive tourists wear the pleated skirt and gold-trimmed side-buttoned jacket for everyday work – it is both tradition and their work uniform. Middle-aged and older housewives in the villages also commonly wear traditional dress day to day. But the younger generation wears T-shirts and jeans, like city people.

What do men wear? Mosuo men today basically do not wear traditional dress; at most they put on a traditional vest as an outer layer. Only at formal occasions (coming-of-age ceremonies, weddings, funerals, festivals) do they wear the full short coat, long trousers and head wrap.

What can you eat at Lugu Lake

Restaurant food: much like Lijiang and Dali – mainly Sichuan cuisine, preserved-pork rib stew, grilled fish, stir-fried wild greens.

Local specialities: pig-belly meat, Sulima wine, Guangdang liquor, roasted potatoes, roasted preserved pork. You cannot eat Lugu Lake fish now (ten-year fishing ban) – the fish in restaurants is all brought in.

Mosuo eating habits

Two meals a day. Traditionally the Mosuo eat two meals – one in the morning, one in the evening. At midday they do not go home to eat; while working in the fields they carry roasted potatoes and preserved pork from home, light a fire at noon, bury the potatoes in hot ashes to roast and grill the meat over the fire. Mosuo farm workers have eaten this field meal for a hundred years.

Eating around the hearth. The Mosuo do not eat at a dining table but around the hearth. Elders sit at the upper position, the young below; everyone has a fixed place.

Offering to the ancestors first. When each meal is ready, the first act is to sprinkle a little food into the hearth as an offering to the ancestors. Only then do people eat.

What to pack for Lugu Lake

Lugu Lake sits at 2,690 m – higher than Lijiang, higher than Dali. Day–night temperature swings are large.

Summer (June–August): daytime over 20 °C, night around 10 °C. Bring short sleeves plus a light jacket; wear the jacket mornings and evenings.

Winter (December–February): daytime around 10 °C, night below zero. Bring a down jacket, thick sweaters and thermal trousers.

Spring and autumn (March–May, September–November): daytime 15–20 °C, night around 5 °C. Bring long sleeves plus a warm jacket.

Whatever the season, bring a windproof jacket – Lugu Lake is windy, and the lakeside is especially cold.