Thai Chicken with Lime, Chili and Fresh Herbs (Larb Gai)

 

This is a great recipe to try if you are on a January health kick and need a dinner idea with some real flavor to spice things up. I have ordered this dish, Larb Gai, at a few Thai restaurants and it never fails to please. Larb Gai is a traditional warm and slightly spicy chicken salad served throughout Laos and Northern Thailand. I find food from this region very satisfying because it incorporates all the different flavors - sweet, salty, spicy and sour, into one meal. This particular dish is extremely healthy and low fat as no oil or fat is used in the preparation. There are endless recipes online for Larb Gai, and although all are slightly different they all contain a few essential ingredients including lime juice, fish sauce, onions, mint and cilantro. Most recipes call for chicken as the protein source, but I believe that ground turkey is a perfectly acceptable swap. I decided to loosely follow a recipe from an old New York Times dining section, swapping turkey for chicken, adding ginger and shallots and beefing up the quantities of onions, herbs and lime juice that they called for. The one ingredient that almost every recipe calls for that is unusual and probably annoying to hunt down is roasted rice powder. Apparently it can be found at most Asian grocery stores, but I decided to forgo buying a jar of something I would use only once or twice and made my own instead as the recipe suggested. It only took a few minutes to make and added a nice subtle crunch to the texture of the dish. If you don't feel like going through the hassle of searching for the powder or making it, the dish will stand alone just fine without it. I know the ingredient list seems lengthy on this recipe, but it is deceiving as this can be made in under a half an hour, which is far less than most Thai take out takes to arrive! 

Thai Chicken with Lime, Chili and Fresh Herbs (Larb Gai) Ingredients: 1/4 cup raw sushi or brown rice or 2 tablespoons roasted rice powder (available at Asian markets) 1 lb. ground chicken or turkey meat 1/2 teaspoon chili powder or crushed red pepper flakes 4 tablespoons fish sauce 1 tablespoon grated or finely chopped fresh ginger root 1 tablespoon sugar 1/4 cup fresh squeezed lime juice 1/4-1/2 cup thinly sliced red onions 1 shallot, thinly sliced 1/4 cup chopped cilantro 1/4 cup whole fresh mint leaves 3 scallions, sliced thin Lettuce leaves, cucumber slices and/or jasmine rice for serving Instructions: If making the rice powder from scratch, heat a skillet over high heat and add the 1/4 cup raw rice to the dry pan. Stir often until the rice is toasted and dark brown, but not black, about 3-5 minutes. Remove from the pan and set aside to cool. Grind the rice in a food processor, mortar and pestle or coffee grinder until it is a coarse powder. Set aside. To cook the chicken, heat a wok or large skillet over medium-high heat. When very hot add 2 tablespoons of water (or spray with canola oil cooking spray) and add the chicken, stirring constantly to break up the lumps. Cook until just cooked through and no longer pink, about 2-4 minutes. Turn off the heat under the pan and add the chili powder, fish sauce, sugar, ginger, lime juice, red onion, shallot and roasted rice powder to the pan. Stir the ingredients into the warm chicken for about a minute. Mix in the cilantro and mint just before serving. Serve the chicken mixture over a bed of butter or Boston lettuce leaves with sliced cucumbers with a side of rice if desired. You can also use the chicken mixture as a filling for lettuce wraps. If eating as a salad, I would say this serves 2-3. If this is being served with rice or other accompaniments it should serve 4. Adapted from the New York Times, June 17, 2009

 

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Comments

[Annie Cronin]

I am trying this recipe tonight Zoe...sounds delicious! I will let you know how it turns out.