A classic Lao chicken salad tossed with fresh herbs, lime, fish sauce, chilli and nutty toasted rice powder, served with lettuce and cucumber.
Ingredients List
Method
- Preheat the oven to 160°C.
- Line a baking tray with baking paper and arrange the chicken thighs on the tray.
- Bake the chicken thighs on the middle rack for 25 minutes, rotating the tray around the halfway mark to ensure even cooking. You want the chicken to be just cooked through, with not too much colour on them. You don’t want the chicken to dry out; they should still be juicy and tender when you take them out of the oven.
- While the chicken is cooking, prepare your other ingredients.
- Make the toasted rice powder: place a frying pan on a medium-high heat, add the glutinous rice and cook for a few minutes, stirring every so often so it doesn’t burn. It should be golden in colour and smell nutty once done. Place the toasted rice in a small blender or food processor and blitz until it’s a fine breadcrumb texture. Set aside.
- Make the chilli powder: place the dried chillies in a small blender or food processor and blitz until it is a fine chilli powder. Set aside 4 tsp of this powder.
- Prepare the herbs: wash the coriander and mint, remove the leaves from the stalks and roughly chop both. Peel and wash the shallots, then halve them and thinly slice.
- Once the chicken is done, cool for 10 minutes and finely dice. It should be a similar size to cooked chicken mince, as that is what you’re mimicking.
- Add the diced chicken, herbs and shallots to a large mixing bowl.
- Add the fish sauce, lime juice, toasted rice powder and chilli powder to the bowl and mix well to combine everything.
- Taste the larb mix. It should be a good balance between spicy, sour and salty. If you need more salt, add a bit more fish sauce; if you need it more sour, add more lime juice; and if you need it more spicy, add more chilli powder.
- To serve, wash the lettuce and separate the leaves, and wash the cucumbers, halve lengthways and thinly slice. Serve the larb with the lettuce leaves and sliced cucumber on the side (you can use these to make lettuce wraps or just eat alongside the salad).
Blue Ribbon
