Larb gai: Thai minced chicken salad with sticky rice

A zingy north-eastern Thai dish of warm minced chicken tossed with lime, fish sauce, herbs and toasted rice, scooped up with lettuce and sticky rice. Fresh, light and very easy to make mild.

Ingredients

• 300 g Glutinous rice, soaked if you have time
• 500 g Chicken mince
• 30 ml Fish sauce
• 2 Limes, juiced
• 5 g Caster sugar
• 80 g Shallots, thinly sliced
• 3 Spring onions, sliced
• 15 g Fresh mint, leaves picked
• 15 g Fresh coriander, chopped
• 2 g Dried chilli flakes, to taste
• 2 Little gem lettuce, leaves separated
• 1 Cucumber, cut into sticks
• 150 g Green beans, trimmed and blanched

Method

1. Rinse the glutinous rice well. Steam it in a sieve lined with a clean cloth over a pan of simmering water, covered, until tender. (If you have soaked it for a few hours it takes about 20 minutes.)
2. Toast 2 tablespoons of the raw glutinous rice in a dry pan, shaking, until golden. Grind it roughly in a pestle and mortar.
3. Put the mince in a frying pan with 4 tablespoons of water and cook over a medium heat, breaking it up, until just cooked through. There is no oil, so keep it moving.
4. Take off the heat and stir in the fish sauce, lime juice and sugar, then the shallots, spring onions, herbs and toasted rice powder. Add chilli flakes to taste.
5. Serve warm with the sticky rice, lettuce leaves to scoop it up, and the cucumber and green beans on the side.