Lao food

Lao food differs significantly from that of neighboring Thailand and Vietnam. Many of these differences can be understood in terms of Lao food's role as an accompaniment for their main staple: sticky rice.

Sticky rice (also called glutinous rice, though it contains no gluten) is a different variety of rice than ordinary white rice. When you hear "sticky" don't think "wet" or "goopy". Sticky rice is much dryer than ordinary white rice, leaving no residue or moisture on your skin when you touch it. It won't stick to your fingers either--sticky rice only sticks to itself, making it perfect for eating with your hands. In fact, it's very difficult to eat it any other way.

Most of the rural population in Laos eat sticky rice almost exclusively (according to wikipedia 80% of employment is subsistence agriculture). It is eaten from small woven bamboo containers that can be carried as one works during the day. With this context in mind, it's easy to understand some of the differences with Thai food:

- Lao food is often served at room temperature
- Lao food involves many raw ingredients
- Lao food must remain relatively dry so it can be eaten by hand using sticky rice

Thai curries frequently use strong herbs and coconut milk or cream, creating rich, fragrant, oily curries with a lot of liquid. By contrast, one of the most common lao dishes called laap (or sometimes larb) is a room-temperature "salad" of minced meat, fish or tofu (sometimes raw), mixed with fresh herbs. Since there is no sauce, it can easily be eaten by hand with sticky rice leaving one's fingers completely clean. I've enjoyed the tofu laap at a local restaurant and can testify that it's delicious.

Much of this information about Lao food comes from one of our favorite local restaurants called Tamarind. One of the owners comes from a rural village and was sent by himself at the age of 10 to Luang Prabang to find and join a wat. When he was older he was lucky enough to find a foreign sponsor who sent him to school where he met and later married his wife (who I think is Australian). Though there are many restaurants in Luang Prabang, he saw that none of them are devoted to explaining and informing tourists about traditional Lao food, which is what he established his restaurant to do. It's currently run with his wife and his younger sister who are very passionate about explaining both food and customs to any patrons who express an interest.

When we eat there, we usually order two of their vegetarian sampler plates, pictured here:


The lower plate contains the ingredients for two types of lettuce wrap. You take the lettuce and spoon in some of the mixture in the upper right--a slightly sweat and very sticky paste made from pounded rice and spices--, add some peanuts and fresh lemon grass and kaffir lime leaf. Alternatively, you can add the spiced eggplant relish, bean thread noodle, raw green bean, shallot and dried chili.

The upper plate, which is more clearly depicted here, contains several types of Lao relish that are eaten by hand with sticky rice. One is a smoked eggplant relish. Another a spicy dip based (unsurprisingly) on chilis. The third a slightly sweat tomato relish. The last, in this picture, is one based on fish, but the dish we usually get has pickled greens instead. The sesame covered waffers to the right are pounded and dried Mekong river "weeds" or vegetables.



Tamarind also sells a cookbook with recipes for these dishes, which we have bought and intend to try back in California!

A final note of etiquette: While Lao use their fingers to eat sticky rice, they only eat white jasmine rice with a spoon, since it isn't as clean on the fingers. They use chopsticks only for noodles (a characteristic shared with Thailand) and forks only for pushing food on to the spoon. It is considered bad manners to put a fork inside one's mouth, or to lick one's fingers.