Lao cuisine

The staple food of Laos is sticky rice (luk khao), and essential ingredients include Lao fish sauce (padaek), galangal, and lemongrass. Much like Vietnam, Lao cuisine makes heavy use of herbs, vegetables, and spices.

Lao cuisine varies significantly from region to region, depending on the availability of ingredients and different cooking methods. Common cooking techniques include grilling, boiling, steaming, searing, and mixing (as in salads). Stir-frying is less common compared to Vietnam or China. Grilling is the most favored cooking method (or ping): Ping gai refers to grilled chicken, ping sin to grilled meat, and ping pa to grilled fish.

Unlike Western cuisine, Lao greens and herbs are usually eaten raw and served on the side without dressing. Also, Lao food never includes sweetness—"sweet and sour" is considered foreign and unusual in Laos. Another distinctive feature is that some dishes are bitter. There is a saying in Lao cuisine: "van pen lom; khom pen ya," meaning "sweet makes you dizzy; bitter makes you healthy."

In terms of eating habits, Lao food is often consumed at room temperature. Traditionally, meals are communal, with diners sitting on a reed mat on the floor around a raised platform made of rattan called a "ka toke." Dishes are served on the ka toke, and when there are many people, multiple ka tokes are prepared. Each ka toke contains one or more baskets of sticky rice, shared by all the diners.

The most famous Lao dish is laab, a spicy mixture of marinated meat and/or fish, served with condiments like herbs, vegetables, and spices.

Tam mak hoong, or the popular "son tam," is a spicy green papaya salad.

In Luang Prabang, a typical dish is mok pha, a noodle dish served with rice crackers and cooked with various animal organs like liver, intestines, blood, and heart.

Other notable Lao dishes include:

• Phak Naam: A salad made from various types of watercress, with a tart lime, egg, and ground peanut dressing.

• Laam Phak: A thick, savory stew of herbs, vegetables, and laab, which is a salad made from minced Mekong River fish and weed, dressed with a spicy, tart sauce.

• Laam: A staple in Luang Prabang cuisine, it’s a thick herb-laden stew made with meat, vegetables, and padaek.

• Sai ua: A sausage made from pork and fresh herbs.

• Ua nor mai: A tender bamboo shoot stuffed with savory pork and deep-fried.

• Khao jii: Lao-style baguettes.