Bok L'hong

Cambodia's green papaya pounded in the mortar with garlic, chilli, long beans, and prahok, the fermented fish paste that separates it from every other salad in the region

Origin: Phnom Penh & Cambodia

From the journey of Papaya.

Bok is the noise a pestle makes against a mortar, and it names the method: things are bruised and part-crushed rather than chopped, so that the dressing is driven into the shreds instead of sitting on them. L'hong is papaya. The dish is sold from carts in the late afternoon, made to order in front of you, and the vendor will ask how many chillies before anything else. Pounded green papaya salads run in a belt across northern mainland Southeast Asia, and they are more alike than different: the same shredded unripe fruit, the same sour, salty, hot, faintly sweet dressing, the same mortar. Most accounts give the origin to Laos, from where the dish moved south and west. What distinguishes the Khmer version is prahok, the thick fermented freshwater fish paste of the Tonlé Sap, which is stronger than fish sauce and gives the salad a low, muddy depth; the Lao use padaek, the Thai use fish sauce, and the difference between the three bowls is almost entirely the difference between those three things. The papaya arrived with the European trade, which reached the Khmer capital at Lovek in the sixteenth century and Phnom Penh after it. The chillies in the mortar came by the same route and from the same continent. The dish those two American plants ended up in is, in every other respect, entirely Cambodian.

Ingredients

Salad

500 g green (unripe) papaya, peeled and shredded into long thin strips
100 g long beans, cut into 4 cm lengths
2 tomatoes, cut into wedges
1 small carrot, shredded

Dressing

4 garlic cloves
6 bird's eye chillies
2 tbsp palm sugar
1 tbsp prahok (fermented fish paste)
2 tbsp fish sauce
3 tbsp lime juice

To Finish

2 tbsp dried shrimp, soaked for 10 minutes
3 tbsp roasted peanuts, roughly crushed

Method

Shred the papaya by hacking shallow cuts down the peeled fruit with a heavy knife and then slicing across them, or use the coarse teeth of a julienne peeler. Rinse and drain well.
Pound the garlic and chillies to a rough paste in a large mortar, then work in the palm sugar, prahok, fish sauce, and lime juice.
Add the long beans and the dried shrimp and bruise them with three or four strokes of the pestle.
Add the papaya, carrot, and tomatoes and pound lightly whilst turning everything with a spoon, about fifteen strokes in all.
Taste and adjust for sour, salt, and heat, scatter with the crushed peanuts, and eat straight away, with sticky rice or grilled meat.

Notes

Prahok is sold in jars in Cambodian and Vietnamese shops. Anchovy paste is not the same thing but is the nearest substitute at hand in a British kitchen. Cambodian vendors often add a few salted preserved crabs, pounded shell and all, which is worth seeking out if you can find them.

The Gastrographer

Name: Bok L'hong
Prep time: 25 min
Total time: 25 min
Yield: 4
Cuisine: Phnom Penh & Cambodia
Ingredients: 500 g green (unripe) papaya, peeled and shredded into long thin strips; 100 g long beans, cut into 4 cm lengths; 2 tomatoes, cut into wedges; 1 small carrot, shredded; 4 garlic cloves; 6 bird's eye chillies; 2 tbsp palm sugar; 1 tbsp prahok (fermented fish paste); 2 tbsp fish sauce; 3 tbsp lime juice; 2 tbsp dried shrimp, soaked for 10 minutes; 3 tbsp roasted peanuts, roughly crushed

Mapping Culinary History

To explore — select an ingredient below.

To explore — select an ingredient below · click any location dot on the map for recipes and stories · browse the information panel on the right · trace the full journey on the timeline.

Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control