Thai Chicken Larb Salad
A Thai national favorite, this spicy salad is created with ground chicken, chopped chestnuts, scallions, mint, Thai basil, cilantro with a lime-sweet hoisin vinaigrette. Served either as a salad, heaped on a bed of crisp lettuce or scooped into soft lettuce cups as a main meal with rice and vegetables.
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Servings: 4 Servings
Calories: 731kcal
Ingredients
For the Rice Powder:
- ⅓ cup uncooked rice such as Calrose
For the Sauce:
- ⅔ cup fresh lime juice
- ⅓ cup fish sauce
- 1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
- 2 tablespoons sweet hoisin sauce
- 1 tablespoon Thai chili garlic sauce
For the Chicken Mix:
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 2 medium shallots thinly sliced
- 1 Thai red chili thinly sliced (or serrano chili)
- 1 lemongrass minced, white part only
- 3 garlic cloves minced
- 1-½ pounds ground chicken
- 8 oz. can of water chestnuts drained and chopped
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
- 1 cup sliced green scallions
- ½ cup chopped fresh mint
- 1 cup chopped fresh Thai basil
- ½ cup chopped fresh cilantro
To Serve the Salad
- Torn baby Gem lettuce for salads
- Butter lettuce leaves for lettuce cups
- Jasmine rice
- Lime wedges
- Sliced cucumber carrot sticks and sliced radish
Instructions
For the Rice Powder:
- Set a small skillet over medium-high heat and when it is hot add the uncooked rice. Cook, stirring frequently until the rice becomes toasted. Remove from the heat, set aside to cool.
- Place the cool rice into a spice mill, coffee grinder, or blender and process to a powder. Reserve.
For the Sauce:
- Combine the lime juice, fish sauce, toasted sesame oil, hoisin sauce, and chili garlic sauce in a small dish. Set aside and reserve.
For the Chicken:
- In a large skillet, heat the oil over medium heat and add the shallots, sliced chili, and lemongrass. Sauté until the shallots are softened, about 1-2 minutes, add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds until fragrant.
- Stir in the ground chicken and sauté for 2 minutes until cooked through, stirring frequently to break up the chicken.
- Add half of the reserved sauce and the rice powder. Stir to combine then remove from the heat and let cool.
- Gently mix in the chopped chestnuts, salt, pepper, scallions, mint, Thai basil, and cilantro.
- Transfer to a serving dish.
To Serve as a Salad:
- Add a bed of torn crisp Little Gem Lettuce to four salad bowls and scoop an equal portion of the chicken larb mixture on each serving.
- Garnish with fresh mint and Thai basil leaves and the vinaigrette alongside.
To Serve as a Main Meal:
- Place the bowl of chicken larb on the table with a plate of crisp lettuce cups, the remaining vinaigrette, lime wedges, hot rice and a selection of fresh vegetables.
- Allow the guests to scoop the chicken larb into lettuce cups and serve themselves to the rice and vegetables.
Notes
- We used Little Gem lettuce for the salad because it is crisp and crunchy. Other options would be Romaine or Iceberg lettuce. Lemongrass paste can be used instead of the fresh lemongrass. Find it in the produce section near the fresh herbs.
- Thai Chicken Larb should be served cold in the crisp lettuce cups. If served hot it will wilt the crisp lettuce.
- Thai Chicken Larb can be served as a salad, an appetizer with lettuce cups, or as a meal with Jasmine rice and sliced vegetables.
- The fish sauce is a main flavor component and a ‘must’ in this dish. We used Red Boat Fish Sauce which is available in most major supermarkets.
- Thai Sweet Hoisin Sauce can be substituted with either honey or sugar.
- Choose lettuce with crisp, soft leaves that are easy to fill and wrap with the chicken mixture. Butter lettuce works well for this dish, it also goes by the names of Boston lettuce and Bibb lettuce. Another good option is to use the leaves of the Little Gem lettuce.
Nutrition
Serving: 1 | Calories: 731kcal | Carbohydrates: 30g | Protein: 66g | Fat: 41g | Saturated Fat: 10g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 26g | Cholesterol: 268mg | Sodium: 3270mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 8g