Ganden Monastery... tea kitchen

Noticing the massive pile of wood outside this building I figured it had to be the kitchen. What else would need all that wood? Turns out it was A kitchen, but the only thing made in here was butter tea. The large round wooden tube with the metal bands was the butter churner, and there were four huge "burners" where the GIANT vats of water were heated to brew the tea. The churner was all geared up, and when the butter was ready, the tea man would turn the crank, and the butter would pour into the giant tea pot with the tea. Lastly someone climbs up on the whole "stove" and adds salt, the final ingredient. The whole concoction is stirred until perfect, then siphoned into beautiful brass urns. This tea is only drunk by monks during their daily mid-day chanting session, which is quite long. It is the job of several younger monks to run back and forth from the tea room to the main assembly hall with these urns of hot butter tea, continuing until every monk has had their fill. The tea kitchen was quite impressive, and evn though it was crazy smoky AND we weren't able to have any tea, we hung out in there for a good while. The tea man was cool, and I think he liked the fact that people were impressed with his contraption.