spices and other dried ingredients at a vientiane market

I don’t consider myself any type of foodie or gourmand, but I do make an effort to try local food wherever I travel. I’m willing to try anything once, even if I can only stomach a couple bites. Usually when I arrive in a new city I’m in Anthony Bourdain mode and will order several of the most exotic dishes, at the oldest and most traditional restaurants, several days in a row. I inevitably exhaust my tolerance (if not my curiosity) within a week; then it’s fruit smoothies, salads, and “western” food until I feel emboldened again.

While I have experienced some novel flavors in Laos, and never regret trying, I haven’t enjoyed much. The positive: there’s a unique smokiness to Laotian food, due to the local pepperwood, methods of fermentation, and charcoal grilling. The negative: most of the food is blandly herbal; many cooks seem frightened to prepare any spicy food for me even when they’ve asked and I’ve assented; the quality of meat and fish has been generally very poor; I’m quite concerned about the toxicity of the river seafood.

Maybe it’s just diner’s remorse for the money I’ve spent (wasted?) but I decided to document everything “local” I ate in Laos. Most of the categories are straightforward; ‘Loaned’ I’m using in the linguistic sense: fusion food that was once foreign but has been wholly incorporated into the local food ‘language’ for at least a couple decades (as opposed to imitation or real foreign cuisine). Within these groups, I’m ranking from least to most enjoyed by yours truly.

Laotian

fermented bamboo “paste.” this is an absolute classic and i just don’t love the taste. obviously sour, but in a sweaty burnt pork kinda way, which i personally hate. (kualao restaurant, vientiane)

whole fried fermented swallows: eat them like softshell crab, but with a 3% risk of hospitalization for GI obstruction 😂. the bodies taste burnt and livery. the limbs are just as chewy as you think they are. and the skulls, ☠️☠️☠️ the tiny bird skulls and brains . . . i couldn’t 😭😭. the dip is eggplant/tomato/chili. (kualao restaurnt, vientiane)

pon mak chong- mixed soaked malva nut with boiled fish filet, herbs, laos eggplant, long bean, and pea eggplant. this was way too watery and herbal for me. (soukvimarn cuisine lao, vientiane)

ping som kai pa- grilled fermented mekong river fish eggs steamed in a wrapped banana leaf. i’ve had the cheaper, available year-round fish and crab versions already in thailand, and didn’t love them, but found them edible. this was much the same, but even stronger tasting, and therefore, to me, somewhat less edible. i’m eager to like this dish but 0 for 3 so far. (soukvimarn cuisine lao, vientiane)

kua mee- fried noodles with scrambled eggs, blood pudding and bean sprouts. it’s considered lao’s answer to pad thai. the blood pudding is far more mild, even sweet, than you might expect. it has a superlight jelly texture. (green pepper, vientiane)

tofu lap. so, so boring. (tamarind, luang prabang)

laap ped- minced duck salad. i don’t particularly love the herbal taste of lao laap, spicy or not. i think i disliked this particular laap because of the low-quality meat used though, i’m open to giving duck lap another shot. (soukvimarn cuisine lao, vientiane)

mekong fish laap. my favorite so far, though i’m pretty sure lap is just not my thing. (tamnak lao, luang prabang)

steamed “wasps” - asian giant hornet larvae steamed in their own hive, in fact. surprisingly mild, tasty enough when dipped in salt and pepper, i’d actually eat these again! (kualao restaurant, vientiane)

fresh bamboo with pork and fish sauce. tasty! (kualao restaurant, vientiane)

khaw khob- puff rice crackers. the plain ones are great in soup, but i really enjoy the ones drizzled with caramelized condensed milk and topped with cashews and raisins. rice cakes are an absolutely tasteless food for the elderly in the US, while here they are a blank canvas for creativity- i’ve even had a high-end version with chocolate and candied butterfly pea flowers. oh well, guess i’ll binge while i’m here! (wat sibounheuang, luang prabang)

khao jee- sticky rice patty on a stick dipped in egg yolk and soy sauce and grilled. super cheap, simple and ubiquitous, easy to eat on the go. (street vendor outside the manivone minimart, vientiane)

barbequed muu haeng (sundried pork) and siin haeng (sundried buffalo meat). both are marinated in a mixture of fish sauce, black soy sauce, oyster sauce, and chopped cilantro, lemongrass, garlic, ginger, and galangal, then quickly deep fried. this one was halfassed and served with a kinda sweet peanut sauce- i’d like to try a properly, thoroughly sundried version (green pepper, vientiane)

tam mak hung and muang- unripe papaya and mango salad. i don’t like the lao version (which uses more unripe mango) as much as the thai version (which is usually only green papaya), but it’s not because of the fruit. apparently lao recipes are flavored with more pungent nam pu (crab paste) and paedek (chunky thick fermented fish sauce), whereas the thai versions go light on (filtered) fish sauce. (doi ka noi, vientiane)

luang pabang salad- green salad with tomatoes, cucumbers, hardboiled egg and oil based egg yolk dressing and topped with peanuts. this one was served with chicken. (phonheuang café, luang prabang)

stir fried matsutake mushrooms. i’ve never met a mushroom i don’t like, and these are no exception. i understand logically why they are so pricy: practically, they’re only harvested in the wild, once a year, in pine forests; culturally, they’re presented as gifts and served on special occasions. however, i was unable to appreciate the strong or delicious cinnamony flavor they’re famous for and therefore found them absurdly overpriced. i regret ordering them stir-fried with garlic and onion as suggested by the restaurant- maybe grilled would have allowed me to understand them better. i’m not against trying again! (kualao restaurant, vientiane)

or lam- eggplant stew with lao pepperwood. i usually get it with beef, which is probably local water buffalo, but it also is made with chicken or fish. the smokiness and heat of the local pepperwood makes this dish; without it, it’s nothing to write home about. i found they used better, fresher, pepperwood in luang prabang than in vientiane. (tamnak lao, luang prabang)

horse urine egg salad- with minced pork, mushroom, onion, snake beans, and red and green chili. these are the pink-shelled lao version of the chinese ‘thousand year’ or ‘century’ preserved eggs. however, as you can see, these century eggs are rather too young, with the center of the yolks still yellow. in lao and thai, they are called ‘horse urine eggs’ because of their ammonia odor, but there’s no actual urine of any species involved. century eggs are one of the *scariest* asian foods, but they actually have a mild taste and are very easy to eat. if you like shrinkwrapped minimart soy sauce-soaked hardboiled eggs, these are the elevated version. i think a good analogy would be eating turkey hill ice cream your whole life, then one day, decades in, tasting ben & jerry’s and realizing that’s what it *should have always been.* (green pepper, vientiane)

green peppers stuffed with glass noodles, minced pork and shrimp (green pepper, vientiane)

khaiphen (deep fried mekong river weed with salt and sesame seeds) and jaew bong (lao’s answer to ketchup: fish sauce, palm sugar, dried chile, garlic, shallots, and tamarind paste) (tamnak lao, luang prabang)

the long one is sai oua- luang prabang herbal pork sausage. the meats are muu haeng (sundried pork) and siin haeng (sundried buffalo meat). i am *very* picky about sausage, generally dislike pork, and did not expect to like this, but this snack plate at tamnak lao is so good i’m afraid to eat it anywhere else! (tamnak lao, vientiane)

tamarind sauce over hardboiled eggs (yoyo’s café, vientiane)

ping gai- bbq chicken. it’s all in the rub and the time marinating. the magic combo in the lao version is oyster sauce and black pepper. but, as in any other bbq culture, secret sauces and a competitive spirit make some chickens exponentially better than others. i find myself afraid to try any of the bajillion street food vendors, and surely have missed out on serious chicken goodness, but this was great too. (doi ka noi, vientiane)

mee ka tee- coconut milk and red curry paste soup with rice noodles, minced pork, and veggies. they were worried about the spice level, but i found this sweet if anything. (tamnak lao, vientiane)

deep fried, pork-stuffed bamboo shoots at tamnak lao, a personal fave 😍😍 (tamnak lao, luang prabang)

paa tod- fried mekong river catfish. many menus feature ‘mekong river fish,’ without explaining which fish exactly they’re selling. while almost anything fried and spicy is tasty, i vastly prefer a thick white flakey fish to anything flat, slimy and gray. even at the same high-end restaurant quality can vary- the first time i ordered this at le calao in luang prabang it was great . . . the second time, not as much. i’ve also recently read very frightening reports about severe heavy metal and chemical poisoning of mekong river food sources thanks to the explosion of unregulated chinese factories on the river over the past decade. in a rural country like laos, fish, frogs and crab *seem* like the freshest, cleanest protein you can get . . . but they may actually be quite dangerous at present. (le calao, luang prabang)

Loaned

various deep fried sandwiches. it’s hard to say whether these arrived with the french or the americans, but these days ham and cheese is just one potential filling- i unwittingly tried imitation crab and spam with mayo, which sounds way way worse than it tasted, and pizza flavor? with tomato sauce and olives. (vendors outside mandivone minimart, vientiane)

Lao feurh- the lao version of vietnamese pho, which frankly is not much different from the original. this version featured the locally famous ban na nu handmade noodles and water buffalo meat. vietnamese first immigrated to laos in substantial numbers as french colonial administrators- one of france’s strategies for maintaining control in their colonies was to move native trainees from different colonies to govern each other. for example, indians from pondichery became police and administrators in vietnam, vietnamese became police and administrators in laos, and so forth. (ຮ້ານອາຫານ ທຸມມາລີ, khoune)

laotian frogs are allegedly scrawnier than french frogs- maybe i just haven’t had the meatiest french frogs, because i didn’t notice. at souvkimarn in vientiane they serve them stuffed with pork; street vendors will stuff them with all kinds of spicy mince meat and vegetables. these were prepared relatively simply with garlic sauce (le calao, luang prabang)

candied hawthorn berry and shredded coconut cake, a local take on the classic chinese pastry made with winter melon. chinese bakeries are common in laos, and deliver their goods to minimarts and restaurants daily. (AB mart, luang prabang)

Junk

these baby monks at family mart in vientiane chose the youtube-famous korean samyang buldak ramen in the original hot chicken and 2x spicy hot chicken flavors. whenever i see really young novices excitedly spending their alms at the minimart, i ignore them until they get to the checkout then pay for them. i don’t (as a rule, i made an exception for this post obvi) photograph them, or talk to them- foreign adults should not be interacting with child monks. i just know these kids usually eat plain free rice all day at the temple, and almost all come from very poor families they no longer see, so i’m happy to be motherly for 30 seconds and buy them a little treat. (famly mart, vientiane)

crispy sundried fish- imagine if potato chips were pure protein. that’s this. i don’t like it, but i get it. (d-mart, vientiane)

crispy luang prabang mushrooms. they have a strong charcoal taste and slight bitterness to them. eating these, it occurred to me that local snacks may be one of the reasons there are far fewer obese people in laos. snacks like these scratch an itch- crunchy, a tiny bit salty, smoky, slightly bitter- they push the palate and satisfy. but even with a couple big beers, it would be impossible to eat a big bag of these, quite unlike the ease with which engineered american junk like a family-size bag of ruffles or whole sleeve of pringles can be downed. (d-mart, vientiane)

tastes exactly like the pork rinds we get in the us. (family mart, vientiane)

sundried chilis, 3 types fried. if someone had told me before i spent a few years in asia that this would be a not-too-spicy beer snack for me, i wouldn’t have believed them. but four years on . . . 😂 (d-mart, vientiane)

boat noodle flavor potato chips. from the thai lay’s subsidiary (god-king of wacky asian potato chip flavors) i’ve only seen this one in laos (not that i was ever looking elsewhere). (AB mart, luang prabang)

these salted bamboo chips only seem to be a thing at tamarind, which is sad because they’re delicious (tamarind, luang prabang)

crispy mixed mushrooms with chili and kefir lime leaves- a personal favorite (d-mart, vientiane)

Sweets

xienkhouang natural highlands forest honey (ignore the food it accompanies, *please,* i can think of few collocations i despise more than “banana pancake trail”). i found it too sweet and lacking complexity, though i also wonder if it was even the real thing- the quality at this restaurant was not great, with food/prices intended solely to bilk western tourists. (cranky-t café, phonsavan)

durian ice cream- the texture of the local ice cream is more ice, less cream. flavors are very mild, and there’s much less added sugar. i don’t mind notoriously stinky durian, but it’s not my favorite either. (simeuang mini-mart, vientiane)

jackfruit ice cream (simeuang mini-mart, vientiane)

khao nom kok - coconut cakes. these are a backpacker night market fave, but i think they could do with a pat of butter or tiny slice of fruit. (luang prabang night market)

black bean and coconut ice cream (simeuang mini-mart, vientiane)

purple sweet potato and taro ice cream (simeuang mini-mart, vientiane)

sugared tamarind- sweet and spicy, lovely despite their very regrettable turdy appearance! i prefer a jam (those fried banana crisp/tamarind jam sandwiches they sell in thailand are **chef’s kiss**) but they’re good like this too if you’re craving a sweet, or need to add a spicy and sweet touch to baked goods or cooked dishes. (d-mart, vientiane)

this is the laotian dessert platter at tamarind restaurant- the place famed for anthony bourdain’s day out with the owner/chef. barely sweet by american standards yet only marginally healthier. i don’t mind it! (tamarind, luang prabang)
mak fahk sangkanyha- sweet pumpkin slice with egg and coconut custard
khao pahd- tapioca thickened coconut and pandan custard. this is the most aesthetic version ever, btw.
khao gam- purple sticky rice with coconut and banana
sticky rice pancake drizzled with honey
mini khao nom kok - coconut cakes
banana fritters

The Butterfly Pea Flower Trend . . .

It turns from blue to purple when you add lime. It has taken over all drinks menus aimed at ladies, alcoholic and non-alcoholic. It’s Lao’s purple draaaaaaaank