Eight hours is a long time to hold a burner. Every year or so somebody sensibly asks whether it is really necessary, and every year or so we test it properly rather than defending it out of habit.
At four hours the broth is perfectly good soup. It tastes of tomato and sesame, it is bright, and it would pass without comment in most restaurants. What it does not have is depth at the back of the mouth — the flavour arrives and then leaves immediately, so the momo sitting in it tastes like a separate thing rather than part of the bowl.
At six hours the sesame has gone from a top note to a base, and the tomato has stopped being sharp. This is the version that made the test interesting, because most people in the blind tasting could not tell six from eight on the first spoonful. They could tell by the fourth.
That is what the last two hours buy: not a bigger flavour, a longer one. The broth stops peaking early and stays level all the way down the bowl, which matters because nobody eats one spoonful of jhol momo.
So the pot goes on at six in the morning and comes off in the early afternoon, the way it has since 2018. It is not efficient. It is the reason the dish has never come off the menu.
