Lao Village

There’s one dish that everyone loves at Lao Village. The crunchy fried rice ($9) is everything you could want in a meal: a mountain of rice, slices of Lao-style ham, shallots, peanuts and golden shards of crispy rice bits that everyone ends up scrabbling over. Simple honest food is the order of the day – there’s nothing glamorous about Lao Village. A security flyscreen door opens onto a dining room that is bare walls, tiled floors and tissue boxes on every table. The menu runs for 31 dishes, each helpfully accompanied by a photo and nothing over $14. Som tum papaya salad is always a highlight. The Thai version ($8) is a mix of shredded green papaya, tomato wedges, dried shrimp and peanuts pounded with a dressing that balances hot, salty, sweet and sour. The Lao style version ($8) is its feistier cousin, a dark and salty concoction that uses anchovies and fermented crabs. Mop them both up with sticky rice ($2.50), served in miniature woven bamboo baskets. Get your protein fix from fatty Lao pork sauages, Lao beef jerky, barbecue ox tongue or a huge slab of barbecue liver (all $9). And don’t forget the quails ($10/$14) either, deep-fried so the skin is crisp and you can crunch down on the bones with ease.