The foods that represent the North for many people are khao soi and northern-style laab, but in considering the roles that each of these dishes plays in the daily life of the country's northerners, it is probably laab that is the region's truer culinary symbol. It is the one dish that is a part of every meal, although others will be served together with it (just as in the Central region, where a number of different items make up every meal).
GROUND DOWN: Left, the seasonings used to make northern-style ‘laab’, and right, the finished dish.
Since laab is eaten with sticky rice, the two together resemble a Central Thai nam prik combo.
Besides its tastiness, one other thing that makes northern laab so popular is that it is eaten together with raw vegetables, adding to its value as a healthy dish. By comparison, khao soi is basically just another noodle dish, another lunchtime option that probably won't be eaten every day.
Northern laab was originally prepared only for big events _ major merit-making ceremonies and community festivals, and for auspicious ceremonies and funerals _ and then it had to be made for large numbers of people. Water buffalo meat was used, since northerners of the past avoided beef, believing that it caused headaches. The meat was eaten raw, with an array of seasonings added both to flavour it and to cover the protein taste and smell of the buffalo.
Making the dish for a crowd of people was a major undertaking. Spices had to be toasted in a pan and ground, and a great quantity of water buffalo meat had to be chopped, requiring a lot of time.
When a water buffalo was slaughtered there was a lot of blood. The villagers did not throw it away but kneaded lemongrass in it to reduce the smell and then added spices to create the dish called lu. This dish is also known it as laab luead.
Eventually cooks started making laab with pork instead of water buffalo meat. This was done to answer the requirements of smaller events.
What's more, there were more pigs than buffalo and they were easier to buy. As people developed a taste for pork it came into wide use as a meat for laab.
FAMOUS FLAVOURS: Sriphloy Thawiroj prepares northern-style ‘laab’ in her kitchen.
The pork was still generally eaten raw, with the usual blood and seasonings, but there was also another choice for people who did not like laab made with raw meat, red in colour because of the blood. The pork would be stir-fried until it was done, then broth from boiled pork bones was added to make a dish that was moist enough for there to be a little bit of broth in the bottom of the dish. It was called laab khua, and with time the popularity of the pork version spread all the way to Bangkok.
Although making northern laab was one long and labour-intensive process, what with all the toasting and pounding of spices and mixing them with dried chillies, today it is a lot easier. The spices are available for sale ready-pounded and mixed in morning and evening fresh markets and other places where prepared foods are sold. People who like to buy ready-to-eat food in the market and take it home will usually find northern laab among the offerings. Any laab vendor whose wares find favour with customers will be successful and find that the preparation as worth the time and effort.
Today I'd like to recommend a place in Chiang Mai that offers very good northern laab. It is only a pushcart, but the food is excellent. Set out on the cart are big bowls filled with every kind of northern laab. He starts selling about 4.30pm, in time for local customers to buy some laab to take home for supper. Two hours later, everything is gone. The cart does business in front of the Amphoe Saraphi building on the old Chiang Mai-Lamphun Road.
The laab was originally sold by a woman named Sriphloy Thawiroj. Her husband was a village headman, or phaw luang, as the position is known locally. Mrs Sriphloy's laab was been popular with the local people for more than 30 years. Besides selling it at her stand in the evening, when a government event was held where food was served her laab was always a star feature among the offerings.
When Mrs Sriphloy's husband retired from his position, he took over selling duties at the pushcart, so that nowadays people refer to the goods as laab phaw luang. Mrs Sriphloy herself now sells her laab before dawn in the Amphoe Saraphi morning market. She does not set up shop there just for the income, but because she is an early riser and wants to put food into monks' bowls during their morning rounds.
Mrs Sriphloy said that northern-style laab is still a regular part of the northern diet.
''The kind made from water buffalo meat is still eaten, although less often than the kind made from raw pork, luu, or the cooked pork version,'' she explained.
''Northerners like eating raw pork laab by pressing some sticky rice into a ball with their hands and dipping it into the laab, then eating some fresh vegetables. The vegetables are local ones that change from season to season.
''Some of the dishes that northerners like to eat together with laab are kaeng khae [a kind of soup dense with seasonal local vegetables] and kaeng pa pak ruam [another vegetable-intensive soup]. You can see that people in the North eat a lot of vegetables. Another reason that people like them so much is that all of them, including the laab, don't cost much to make.''
In the days when Mrs Sriphloy was selling the laab herself, it sold best during the season when longans were being harvested, because people did not have enough time to cook for themselves.
They had to buy prepared food and take it home to eat. Now, with her husband doing the selling, customers tend to be people who work in Chiang Mai City and buy the laab on the way home for supper.
This shows that no matter what the situation may be, laab is still a central part of the northern diet.
As regards the seasoning used, Mrs Sriphloy said that most people think that the seeds of the makhwaen tree (Thai prickly ash) are the main part of the story.
''Actually, they are only one of 12 seasonings that are used,'' she explained. ''These are mixed with finely-pounded dried chillies, and all of them are toasted in a pan and pounded by hand. I make the seasoning mixture in big quantities, enough to last for several days. I don't use any special quantities or proportions in mixing the ingredients, I just go by sight and experience. When people ask how much of each ingredient goes in, I really don't have an answer for them.''
With this style of laab so firmly fixed in the regional diet, there is nothing surprising in the claim that it is the food that best symbolises the North. Anyone who wants to try Mrs Sriphloy's laab can taste it on any day at the Saraphi morning market between 6am and 8am, or they can buy some in the evening between 4.30pm and 7pm from her husband, Phaw Luang Phajon Thawiroj, whose pushcart sets up in front of the Amphoe Saraphi building. The telephone number is 08-0742-6107.
