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Photos by MJ Klein  WARNING: FOOD PHOTOS!

As you recall from our series on our recent Thai-Lao trip, we traveled to Laos on Day 3.  We didn’t get any food photos because we were eating on the run so-to-speak and we had nothing remarkable.  So we’ll continue with Day 4 and show you what we had to eat on our first day back in Laos.

The first order of business for the day was breakfast:

Spicy Girl (left) took us to this shop where she and Prince Roy enjoy the traditional Lao breakfast dish – noodle soup.  Michael Cannon gives it a try in this first photo.

This is what it looks like, close up – without the oil bread shown on the table in the previous photo.  Not being much of a breakfast eater myself, I found this soup to be quite hearty, especially in the morning.  Notice how much cilantro (or coriander) is present.   That spice is a stable of SE Asian cooking.

As we were walking about town, we noticed several vendors setting up to sell their wares on the street.  This is a typical cart used in Laos for transporting goods to the market.  Often the goods are sold directly off the cart, as is being done here.

Later on we had lunch.  This is a type of sour meat that is famous in SE Asia.

This is Lao style sausage.  While not quite as good (to my tastes) as the Issan Sausage in NE Thailand, I don’t want to give you the impression that it was bad – on the contrary, it was very good.  I just prefer the Thai sausage.  But, I saw them on the menu and I had to try them, you understand!

This is a Lao style soup and it was very good.  Rich broth and just loaded with fresh vegetables and pieces of fish.

This seemingly unassuming dish was my evening meal.  This is “Lao Lap,” a version of “krapau mu” which is a Thai dish featuring basil and garlic.  Readers of this blog probably know the Thai version by now.  The Lao version was even better than most Thai versions I’ve had.  The flavor was richer and even more delicate than I’ve become accustomed to by eating the Thai dish.  I cannot say enough good about this dish.  I ate it on more than one occasion and I’ve been known to go back and get a second order of it!  Lao Lap is wonderful over steamed rice too!

Thanks for reading.  We’ll be bringing you the next installment soon, so you don’t want to miss out on anything.  You can subscribe to our blog using any of the methods at the top left column.  We also thank you in advance for your fine comments, recommendations and re-tweets of our articles.

Here is a small preview of our next article.  Day 5 was when I tried a Lao “whisky bucket” for the first time!