{"id":128808,"title":"Canard du M\u00e9kong Chicken Lap","modified":"2026-06-11T16:19:18+02:00","plain":"This recipe comes entirely from the now-closed blog \u201cLe Canard du M\u00e9kong,\u201d whose domain name has since lapsed. I tried to get in touch with Phil, without success… After a bit of searching, I managed to recover the recipe and photos, which I am sharing here for posterity after a member of the official group regretted that they had disappeared. You can also find some of his recipes on his YouTube channel, although it has been inactive for a long time. I have kept the original text, added my usual paragraph explaining the ingredients, and simplified the recipe section to make it a little more compact. What follows is therefore almost exactly what appeared on the Canard du M\u00e9kong website at the time\u2014happy cooking!\n\n\n\nA cold meat salad is always one of the most welcome dishes when the temperature starts to climb. Admittedly, for anyone who spent the summer in France that year, the weather was more likely to inspire cravings for pot-au-feu than for lap ( also written laap… larb… or larp…! ), a meat dish, more rarely made with fish, served at celebrations ( which is to say, very often over there ;-)) with plenty of raw vegetables and the ever-present sticky rice, in northern Thailand, in parts of Cambodia, and especially in Laos.\n\n\n\nThe Moo Nam Tok Thai pork salad is also a favorite\n\n\n\nPurists\u2014and we do not count ourselves among them\u2014will point out that to make this dish, which could easily be called the national dish of Laos, you need a very particular sauce found only there…  padaek, a fairly thick brine in which freshwater fish ferment for many months, sometimes up to a year, in salt and rice bran.\n\n\n\nCross the Lao-Thai border into Isan, the northeastern region of the kingdom where many people share a strong Lao cultural heritage, and padaek becomes pla ra. As the story goes, during several demonstrations against the authorities, ordinary Bangkok residents, often originally from Isan, would throw bags filled with pla ra to push back the police sent in to quell the unrest…! And so the edible Molotov cocktail was born…\n\n\n\nAs you may have gathered, it helps to be deeply familiar with Asian flavors\u2014or to have strong ties to that part of the world\u2014to tolerate these aromas and appreciate the bold, rustic tastes we love so much here …! It is also said that pieces of these fermented river fish may harbor persistent parasites, so there can be a small health risk involved…\n\n\n\nIn any case, I have never seen traditionally made padaek for sale in France, and I tend to replace dishes that call for padaek or prahok, Cambodia\u2019s own special freshwater fish brine, with sauces that are easy to find in Asian grocery stores in France.\n\n\n\nDiscover the crying tiger beef recipe\n\n\n\nAs substitutes, you can also look for mam nem or the thicker, mam ca sac ( the Vietnamese names you will see on the jars ), condiments so pungent they would almost make nuoc mam seem like cologne… :-)) Of course, nuoc mam will still do the job perfectly well if you do not feel like tackling the chore of a full shopping trip…\n\n\n\nBecause in the end, there is no mistaking it… the soul of this dish lies in its inimitable combination of aromatic herbs, especially very fresh mint, and above all toasted, ground sticky rice, which is sprinkled over the lap. Add one final citrusy note with a little galangal or lemongrass, which grows very easily in a pot here in Corsica, and you have a hearty, flavorful meal that is wonderfully simple to prepare.\n\n\n\nThe main ingredients in chicken lap\n\n\n\nFish sauce: As explained above, it stands in for the padaek. It brings a delicious umami depth and briny savoriness to the dish\n\n\n\nSticky rice: its texture is fantastic alongside the dish, and when toasted and ground, it adds that irresistible \u201clittle something\u201d\n\n\n\n\n\n\tChicken Laap - Mekong Duck\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\n\t\t2 chicken thighs2 shallots, sliced1 stalk lemongrass3 small chilies, sliced3 tablespoons uncooked sticky rice3 tablespoons chicken stock0.5 tablespoon fish sauce4 tablespoons lime juice1 teaspoon saltGarnishes and accompaniments2.5 tablespoons fish sauce1\/3 cucumbera few lettuce leaves80 g mung beansa few mint leaves250 g uncooked sticky rice\t\n\t\n\t\tRinse the 250 g of sticky rice thoroughly, cover with water, and soak for 4 hours.Steam the sticky rice for 20-25 minutes, turning it once during cooking.Remove the bones from the chicken and mince the meat. Cover the skin and bones with water and simmer for 1 hour over medium heat to make stock. Strain and reserve 4 tablespoons. Freeze the rest.Toast the uncooked sticky rice in a wok, then grind it finely. Finely chop the lemongrass, chilies, herbs, and shallots.Saut\u00e9 the minced chicken with the fish sauce and stock for 5-7 minutes. Add the shallot.In a mixing bowl, combine the herbs, lemongrass, chilies, remaining fish sauce, lime juice, and toasted sticky rice. Serve with cucumber, cabbage, and mung beans, alongside the cooked sticky rice.\t\n\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\n\t\tMain courseIndonesian","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128808"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":128905,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128808\/revisions\/128905"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}