Ground meat is tossed with spicy, savory, sweet, tangy, and umami sauce will definitely whet your appetite for sure. This incredibly easy to put together Thai salad will be your new favorite.
My love affair with Thai cuisine has been long established before this blog even existed. I was exposed to Thai food a lot back in the college days and seriously…everything that I tried just suited my palates. The sweetness, saltiness, sourness, spicyness. Just typing this post I can feel the saliva is filling up my mouth now. Thai food uses a lot of fresh herbs too and I just absolutely love it. This Thai larb moo or known as spicy pork salad is one of my favorite Thai dishes.
Larb moo or sometimes you’ll see written as laap is a Thai spicy pork salad. There are many different kind of laap and usually it does involve some kind of meat such as beef, pork, offal, duck, and fish. The toasted sticky rice powder (khau kua) really adds a nice finishing touch and texture to the overall dish. I love the aromatic nutty flavor to it. When I saw an Instagram friend made this larb moo, I knew immediately I need to satisfy this craving I had and voila….here it is and I’m not disappointed !!!
Now I know what foodgasm is like 🙂 Mind you, I didn’t come up with that term 😉
Thai larb moo (Spicy Thai Ground Meat Salad)
Ingredients
Larb moo:
- 2 Tbsp cooking oil
- 1 lb ground chicken you can also use beef, turkey, or pork
- 2 Kaffir-lime leaves -optional very thinly sliced and remove the hard stems if any
- 1 Tbsp fish sauce
Serve with:
- Fresh lettuce or any green salad of your choice
- ½ large purple onion /3-4 shallots peeled and thinly sliced
- ½ cup of fresh mint leaves
- ½ cup of fresh Thai basil leaves
- 3-4 Thai chilis leave them whole or chopped them up, it's up to you
Dressing :
- 2 Tbsp fish sauce
- 2 cloves garlic finely minced
- 1 Tbsp coconut sugar/regular sugar
- â…“ cup of lime juice
Toasted sticky rice powder:
- â…“ cup sticky rice/glutinous rice flour
Instructions
- Place the sticky rice flour in a dry heated skillet/wok over medium heat and stir fry until the flour turns slightly yellowish in color and you can start smelling the nuttiness. Remove from the heat and transfer into a dish and let it cool
- You can also use glutinous rice. Rinse the rice with water and then drain off and lightly pat dry with paper towel. Transfer to a small skillet and toast on a low to medium heat until the rice is aromatic and lightly brown (but not burn). It may take about 30 minutes to toast the rice. Transfer to food processor and grind into powder. You can store the rest in the air-tight container at room temperature for up to a week (for maximum flavor)
- In a large skillet, preheat some oil. Stir fry the ground pork for until they start turning into opaque in color. Add in fish sauce and let it cook on strong simmer until the juice from the meat is almost gone, but not completely dry. Remove from the heat
Dressing:
- Whisk/stir all the ingredients for dressing in a bowl and stir to dissolve the sugar. Set aside. You can make this in a bigger batch and store in fridge for up to one week and just use whenever you fix the salad
To assemble:
- I arranged lettuce leaves around the edge of the platter. Transfer the cooked meat into the middle of the platter. Sprinkle with some toasted sticky rice powder and mixt it up a little. Add in the sliced onions/shallots, the fresh herbs like mints, basil and then the chilis. Pour the dressing over and stir to combine everything. Sprinkle with more toasted sticky rice powder. Serve immediately
2 comments
I really enjoy how you spiced up this dish, we are living in a small town for the summer that has no Thai food, I am feeling very deprived, will have to make this. Thanks!!!
ohh….I think you gonna love it Cheri.