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Published: January 15th 2007
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I've forgotten the name of this fruit!
But who can put words to a thing that looks like this anyway! Sarahs turn (we're twee aren't we)
Well as I sit here stuffed full of Baguette and Coffee shake, it seems a little bit hard to conjure up the pleasures of Laos food that I've been meaning to write about, but I'll do my (full) best. The trouble is that there isn't really any time of the day that we aren't full, as we just kind of hop round restaurants and food stalls during most of our waking hours. As a guy at my cooking class said "I thought I'd lose weight in Asia!". Hell no.
Most food here is really cheap (from about 70c) but if you want Western food you can pay up to $12 for a meal. We have eaten out a couple of times at Western (as in France, not America) places but its worth noting that our stomachs drove us to this, as not long after the urge to eat Western food consumed us we ended up getting sick... I think it's a sure fire way of knowing when to book yourself in somewhere nice and not plan any cave trips - when you start feeling like eating bland chicken fillets and french fries.
Beer Lao tasting platter
This was a beer lao tasting platter we had at a really good place called Tamarind. Casava wafer at the back with sticky rice crackers, Mekong weed wafers with pickled greens and deep fried bananas. Also worth noting is that most Western food here is terrible. The best example of this was at the really classy 'Villa Santi' restaurant where we were served a salad containing slices of processed cheese and processed ham. There are exceptions to this though - we ate at one of the Lonely Planet endorsed French restaurants last night, and it was really good. Rabbit stew with white wine and mushrooms anyone? Beef fillet with goats cheese and fresh basil sauce? This cost us about $9 each, which was a bit of a splurge, but we figure it's cheaper here than in France...
Lao food is really tasty - some of it quite heavy and rich like the 'Luang Prabang Sausages'. And some of it is really light and aromatic and fresh, like the Laap which is a dish with diced meat (any kind) and herbs and lime juice mixed through it. It's all served with sticky rice, which you roll into balls with your hands and dip and grap into other bowls of food to create a tasty mouthful.
Some stand outs have been:
Lemongrass stuffed with pork - wow, this one was really good, the end
Another tasting platter at Tamarind
This one had Luang Prabang Sausages, stuffed lettuce leaves, bamboo shoots and ginger, and 'heavenly beef' (dried beef - tasty!) of a lemongrass stalk is frayed and then pork bits are stuck into the frays, and then its covered in a batter and then fried. Such a good flavour.
Laap - the best of this was at the cooking school - I'll put the recipe at the bottom.
Mekong Weed wafers - A kind of seaweed that is made into paper thin wafers and served with a little bit of pickled greens on top.
Any kind of soup - They give you a big bowl of spicy soup with sprouts, meat, greens, and chilli in it. Not sure if this is traditionally Lao. A really good lunch on a hot day surprisingly.
Baguettes with butter and Jam! - Its a bit hit and miss on the baguette side of things (we went to the Lonely Planets recommended place for the best baguettes in town and they turned out to be just a long white bread roll) but when it's good it's very very good...
Cafe Lao - specially good with about 1 centimetre of condensed milk in the bottom of the cup. Nice strong coffee.
Fruit shakes - you can choose any kind you
like, mixed with coconut juice. Papaya, melon, banana, pineapple, watermelon, the list goes on for a full page, incl fruit we've never heard of, we're slowly making our way down it!
Green Papaya salad - Whoa. This is a really really hot salad made with unripe papaya and chilli and fish sauce. Needs a beer to go with it.
Buffalo skin - I chewed on this for about 3 minutes trying to get it so that I could swallow it. Now I know what Wallace feels like when he's chewing his hide toys. It was quite tasy though.
Jeowbong - a sticky gloopy chilli paste that's both hot and sweet. Goes with everything.
Here is a recipe for Chicken Laap - warning, it involves a heck of a lot of chopping.
Ingredients:
200 g chicken mince - no fat. (you can buy a large chicken breast and chop chop chop until its a fine mince)
2 tablespoons of banana flower finely chopped (never seen any in NZ so just leave it out)
2 kaffir lime leaves sliced thinly
1 spring onion sliced thinly
2 shallots sliced finely
2 garlic cloves sliced finely
1 bunch coriander
cut up finely (green part only)
2 stalks lemongrass sliced finely
6 large rocket leaves sliced finely
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 T rice powder (dry fry rice until it begins to turn golden, then whix in the blender until it's a fine powder)
1 teaspoon chilli powder
1/4 teaspoon fish sauce
1 T fried garlic (can be bought in Asian supermarkets, but otherwise just fry garlic in lots of oil until it is pale golden and drain)
1 T fried spring onion (same goes as above)
1 medium lime
1 cube (or 1/4 teaspoon) of chicken or pork stock mixed with 2 tablespoon hot water
1. Put the stock, chicken mince and HALF the lime juice into a wok
2. Place over a low heat and keep stirring until the mince is cooked through and water reduced
3. Remove from the heat and put in a bowl
4. Add the banana flower
5. Add kaffir lime leaves, spring onion, shallot, garlic, coriander, lemongrass and rocket and mix well.
6. Add salt, rice powder, chilli powder, fish sauce, fried garlic and fried onion. Mix well.
7. Pour the remainder of the lime juice over the salad and give it a
Some of the food we made (and ate) at the cooking class
Sorry its out of focus - Laap is on the right, fried eggplant with pork in the centre and Lao pork casserole at the back. quick stir. Serve.
To give it true Lao style you need to put a cucumber slice in each corner of the plate and then a row of tomato slices along one end to present it. No zschuching here!
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alex
non-member comment
Wicked. The 'butchers'shops are stunning aye. Not sure of the Lao name for that pink fruit with pips, but have heard it called 'dragon-fruit', is tasty too!