A range of dried fish on display at Mokokchung market in Nagaland. Pics/Gayatri Desai

It was a bunch of activists who helped chef Gayatri Desai discover lip-smacking versions of rice liquor on the outskirts of Imphal, when she visited the Manipuri capital on a 20-day solo trip to the northeast last month. "I met them by chance. They drove me to a location where locals were brewing wine and beer in hiding using black rice tablets. I brought back a few tablets with me," Desai recollects.