A Veggie Twist on Laarb

I had a craving for my Dad’s laarb. He does amazing things with ground beef and I love coming up to his cooking.

On the way to the store, I called him for the ingredients. At the end of our conversation, I mentioned I was trying it all with some fake meat — tofu grounded up to look like beef. I imagined the look of disbelief on his face.

originally uploaded by queenkv.

Here’s my vegetarian version of my Dad’s Laarb. I used Morning Star’s grilled beef starter. I could totally taste the difference between ground beef and this substitute because I knew what was going into the dish. But I’d love to do a blind taste test some day and see if my palate knows the difference.

• 1/2 small onion (chopped)
• 2 cloves of garlic (chopped)
• Morning Star’s grilled beef starter (the entire bag)
• Handful of cliantro
• A few teaspoons of Patis (or fish sauce)
• Lemon or lime juice

First, I sauteed the chopped onion and garlic in vegetable oil in our paella pan (you could use any large pan, really). When the chopped pieces softened up, I added the beef starter, some cilantro, lemon or lime juice and about 3-4 teaspoons of fish sauce. (I didn’t feel like paying through the nose for Patis at the Filipino store in Topeka).

That’s it. Serve it with rice and top the tofu mixture with the remaining cilantro leaves.

On this dish, I forgot to add the citrus juice in the last step. We ended-up squirting it on top of the tofu mix, after it came out of our paella pan. That helped seal in the flavors and get it closer to the taste of my Dad’s meat version. Overall, it had a nice mix of Thai/Filipino flavors: garlic, citrus and an echo of meaty goodnes.