Lao recipes from my party

All of these recipes come from Traditional Recipes of Laos, by Phia Sing (1898-1967), Royal Master of Ceremonies at the court of Luang Prabang, an accomplished physician, architect, choreographer, sculptor, painter and poet, and not coincidentally Head Chef at the Royal Court. The book was edited by Alan Davidson, former Ambassador to Laos and prominent food writer, who provides extensive descriptions of Lao ingredients, equipment and eating habits in the first part of the book, and illustrated by the Lao artists Tho Soun Vannithone, Elian Bleton Souvannavong and Thao Singha. It was published by Prospect Books, most recently in 2000, and has ISBN number 0 907325 60 2. You can read Davidson's intoduction, a very interesting review of the book, and a more general article on Lao cuisine online, but unfortunately not (until now) the tale of how the book came to be published. In 1974, Davidson was in the course of writing Fish and Fish Dishes of Laos, and having trouble finding some recipes. He was granted an interview by the Crown Prince to discuss the book (the Crown Prince was a noted fisherman), and mentioned this difficulty. The Crown Prince told him to wait for a moment, went away for a few minutes, and came back with a couple of school exercise books. These were the recipe books of the late Phia Sing, who had asked for them to be published and the money used to build a Buddhist shrine in Luang Prabang: the Crown Prince had promised to do this, but forgotten this until Davidson's chance remark. A year later, the Royal government had fallen to the communist Pathet Lao guerillas, and the original notebooks were lost forever.

Without further ado, here are the recipes we made at the party:

Jum som phak kad

(Pickled greens, Lao style)

Ingredients

1 pa keng (a barb, see below), washed and gutted
2 straight-bulbed spring onions -- crush the heads and then stuff them into the fish, which should also be salted and then placed in a bamboo holder [or just a grill pan], ready for grilling
1 medium size bowl (3/4 pint) of som phak kad (pickled 'greens' of the cabbage family)
3 or more straight-bulbed spring onions, finely chopped
1 piece of ginger, finely chopped
2 (small) heads of garlic -- place them in the hot embers of a charcoal fire, but do not let them cook as much as is usual in other recipes -- then chop them finely
[obviously, we didn't use this much garlic. Also, we grilled them rather than putting them in embers]
3 sprigs of coriander, finely chopped
1 fresh red chilli pepper, finely chopped
10 lettuces, washed
[I assume Lao lettuces must be tiny - we used 2 icebergs, and had more than enough]
1 na (1/2 kilo) of rice vermicelli, cut into pieces of 3cm
2 small round eggplants, cut into slices 1cm thick and washed
1 small bowl (1/2 pint) of beef stock [or you could use veg. stock - we forgot this bit]

Method

Grill the fish in its bamboo holder and set it aside on a platter.

Mix together thoroughly the pickled greens and the finely chopped ingredients (except for the coriander). Put this mixture on a platter and garnish it with chopped coriander.

Arrange the washed lettuces around the sides of a third platter and put the rice vermicelli in the centre. Place the slices of eggplant around the rice vermicelli.

Add the fish sauce to the beef broth and taste it. It should be quite salty. Put it in a small bowl, garnish it with chopped coriander and serve it together with the other prepared platters.

Note

Any fish could be used for making this dish but all others taste very different from the pa keng. Jum Som Phak should, therefore, be made with pa keng if possible. If pa keng is not available, other fish may be used.

[pa keng is osteochilus prosemion, about 25cm long and a native of the Mekong. We used rainbow trout]

Kai pad khing

(Fried Chicken with Ginger)

1 chicken, cleaned and gutted - divide it first into two breast pieces and two leg pieces, then cut and divide the legs from the drumsticks; as for the feet, they should be cut off at the knee joints; the wings should also be separated at the shoulder bones, and each breast cut into two parts; the remaining carcase should be cut into large pieces -- do not cut bones into small pieces
[or just loads of pre-cut bits of chicken, as we used]
1 chicken gizzard, turned inside out, washed salted, sprinkled with ground black pepper and left on a plate
1 fully grown coconut, opened, the meat grated and two extractions of coconut milk squeezed out, only a little from each extraction
[It's fine to use tinned coconut, or rehydrated coconut cream, or whatever. The first extraction is thicker than the second.]
2 pieces ginger, thinly sliced; squeeze out the liquid and fry it in pork fat until it gives off a good aroma, then remove it from the fat and leave it on a plate
shallots, peeled -- fry them until they give off a good aroma and are nice and golden, then leave them on a plate -- you should have enough to fill a large rice-bowl
1 large onion, peeled and finely chopped and set aside in a bowl
straight-bulbed spring onions -- the green parts only, cut into pieces 2cm long
3 (small) heads garlic -- take off the outer skin and peel each clove, then crush them on a chopping board
[again, we didn't use anything like this much]
salt, fish sauce
chopped coriander leaves
ground black pepper

Method

Put a wok on the fire, and 1 ladleful of pork fat [oil] in it. Add the chopped onion and fry it until it gives off a good smell and has turned golden. Next, put in the chicken and the crushed garlic. Turn the pieces of chicken frequently, add the fish sauce and mix everything together. If there seems to be too much fat, pour off some of it. Then add the second extraction of coconut milk and put the lid on the pan. When the chicken is tender, add the first extraction of coconut milk. When this comes to the boil, add the fried shallots and the fried ginger. Taste and check the saltiness. Then add the chopped spring onion leaves. Dish up on a platter and garnish with ground black pepper and chopped coriander leaves; then serve.

Soop houa phak sao souan

(Mixed Cooked Vegetables, Country Style)

Ingredients

Boil the following vegetables with a pinch of salt until cooked, then rinse them with cold water and drain them
1 small rice-bowl of carrots, scraped, washed and diced
1 small rice-bowl of Chinese radishes [we used ordinary radishes], scraped, washed and diced
1 small rice-bowl of potatoes, scraped, washed and diced
1 small rice-bowl of cauliflower flowerets, washed
1 small rice-bowl of manges-tout, stringed and cut into pieces the length of the joint of a finger
[that's a macabre image, don't you think?]
The sesame-seed accompaniment
minced pork, a quantity the size of a duck's egg, boiled with a little fish sauce then pounded finely [we left this out]
6 dried shrimps, washed and fried in pork fat until crisp, then pounded finely [we left this out]
3 soupspoonfuls of (shelled) peanuts, toasted in a hot, dry pan and then rubbed together so that their skins come off.
2 soupspoonfuls of sesame seeds, toasted by stirring them over a medium head in a (dry) pan, and then pounded finely
5 sprigs of coriander, finely chopped
1 spring onion, the leaves only, finely chopped
fish sauce
The kheuang hom mok
6 (small) shallots which have been cooked in the embers of a charcoal fire
3 (small) heads of garlic, also cooked in the embers of a charcoal fire
[as before, we grilled these, and adjusted the amount of garlic radically downwards]
1/2 coffespoonful of ground dried chilli pepper
The shallots, garlic and chilli are to be pounded together finely
meat [veg] broth
Shared ingredients
salt and ground black pepper
4 hard boiled duck's [hen's] eggs -- separate the yolks and chop up the whites

Method

Put the kheuang hom mok in a big bowl, add a small amount of broth and stir until they are mixed. Add, together, the other pounded ingredients, with salt and fish sauce. Pound the yolks of the duck's eggs and mix them in also. Taste and check the saltiness -- the mixture should be quite salty. Make sure also that it is not too runny. Sprinkle in the chopped onion, the chopped coriander and some ground black pepper, and mix thoroughly.

Put the boiled vegetables in a mixing bowl, together with the chopped whites of the duck's eggs. Pour the first mixture over the vegetables and mix thoroughly. Dish up on a platter and serve, accompanied by grilled pork and rice cakes.

Note

The accompaniments for Soop Houa Phak Sao Souan should be grilled pork (as mentioned above, and such as could be bought ready prepared in a Lao market) or fried chicken or grilled fish, and rice cakes. It may be served with one or more of these, but the rice cakes must not be omitted. [D'oh!]