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I was surprisingly happy to have spotted Nghapi (Dahpithu) at a restaurant in Hong Kong

While dining at one of the Chinese traditional restaurants at downtown Hong Kong I found that one of the pastes/sauces was nothing but what Mara people called it as Dahpithu, in Lusei Mizo Language it is known as Dangpuithu or some called it Nghapi and it has been everyone’s favorite, it is a ‘Fermented fish paste’.

Definition: It is Paste prepared from salted fish that has been macerated, sometimes to a smooth consistency, and allowed to ferment or ripen. It is frequently maligned as being bad smelling or rotten by those who dislike or who  have smelled it for the first time.

In Latin, it is known as Garum and it was quite popular in Classical Roman cooking.

In English it was formerly translated as fishpickle. The original Worcestershire sauce was a similar product, brought to England from India. Some have suggested ‘anchovy paste’ as the modern descendant of garum, but it is not fermented.

Variants of Dahpithu : A very popular paste in South East Asian countries:

The variety from Vietnam is generally called nước mắm, and similar condiments from Thailand and Myanmar (Burma) are called nam pla (น้ำปลา) and ngan byar yay respectively. In Cambodia, it is known as teuk trei and range from a variety of sauces using fish sauce as a base. The Indonesian semisolid fish paste trasi, the Cambodian prahok and the Malay fermented krill brick belacan are other popular variations of the same theme. The similar Filipino version common to Indo-China is called patis. It is the by-product of a popular crude fish sauce, bagoong.

With inputs from Wikipedia