Laos is blessed with a rich variety of food cooked, served and eaten on the street. Among the most common is tqm maak-hung (generally known as tqm som in Vientiane), a spicy, tangy salad made by pounding shredded green papaya, lime juice, chillies, garlic, pqa daek, nam phdk-kdat (a paste of boiled, fermented lettuce leaves) and various other ingredients together in a large mortar. This is a favourite market and street-vendor food - customers typically inspect the array of possible tqm maak-hung ingredients the vendor has spread out next to the mortar, then order a custom mix. For something different, ask the pounder to throw in a few maak kawk, a sour, olive-shaped fruit.

The Lao love a good ping (grill), and you'll find all manner of meats and offals grilling over makeshift barbecues. Ping kal (grilled chicken) is a favorite, and involves the cook taking chickens (whole or dissected) and rubbing them with a marinade of garlic, coriander root, black 1 pepper and salt or fish sauce before cooking them slowly over hot coals. But our favourite Is definitely ping pqa (grilled fish). Ping pqa is prepared by scaling a fish, rubbing it with a thick f layer of salt and stuffing a handful of lemongrass stems down its throat before slowly grilling it. Other ingredients can be added, but it's the lemongrass and the fact the fish retains most of  its moisture that we love. Delicious.