Cambodian food doesn’t have a great press, and has long been overshadowed by its neighbours Vietnam and Thailand. But there is much more to this fresh, healthy cuisine with its seasonal dishes of bitter, sour, sweet, salty and umami flavours than meets the eye. Here are five of Cambodia’s best meals, all of which can be had for a few dollars – and deserve far wider recognition.
Boiled crab with salt, pepper and lime dip
Dish: This incredibly simple dip is made from sea salt, Cambodia’s world-beating Kampot pepper, and lime juice. You’ll get it with everything from hunks of spit-roast calf to green mango. But it goes best with freshly boiled blue swimmer crabs, which although contain little brown head meat, and virtually no morsels in the claws, more than make up for it with the generously fleshy chine. In restaurants, they usually serve a mix of two thirds freshly-ground black pepper to one third salt then carefully squeeze in two or three lime quarters and mix it in front of you. It might seem a laughably simple procedure, but they take it as seriously as a chef de rang would the preparation of crepe suzette, squeezing in the ‘correct’ amount of lime juice until there is the right moistness to the sauce.
Where: You’ll have few better days than sitting at a restaurant in Kep’s famous crab market, looking out to sea, while supping cold beer and dunking freshly boiled crab into this splendid dip.
Chicken porridge soup
Dish: Cambodia is truly the land of soups. I don’t think you’ll find a country with such a high proportion on menus, and there is nearly always a broth at every family meal. But of all the great soups in Cambodia, and there are plenty, this is my favourite. The bowl is always topped with nutty, browned garlic, and as you dig into the rice, there is the occasional limp crunch of bean sprouts and the pleasing discovery of a little piece of chicken or bone to suck on. Then there is the chicken stock, hinting of lime leaf and lemon grass, julienne strips of ginger, the soapy richness of blood pudding, and the yolks taken from the hens’ ovaries, which glint like amber pearls. I could go on…
Where: Food stalls in Phnom Penh’s Central Market. It’s a seething sauna, but the soups are second to none.
Prahok ling
Dish: This is an incredibly powerful meal, flavoured with Cambodia’s notoriously foul-smelling fermented fish paste, prahok. The paste is fried with hand-chopped pork, onion, garlic, egg, and chilli. And it’s so strong there are strict government laws in place to ensure you only get a small saucer of the stuff, which you eat with boiled jasmine rice and chunks of raw aubergine, cucumber, green tomato, and white cabbage to take the edge off the extremely pungent, blue cheese-like taste.
Where: Khmer Food Village, opposite NagaWorld in Phnom Penh, or Bopha Leak Khluon restaurant, near Hotel de la Paix, Siem Reap.
Cambodian dried fish omelette
Dish: The best version I’ve had was made with duck eggs and tiny smoked fish that had been soaked in brine, and then grilled over smouldering wood for eight hours until they were hard and chewy. But mostly dried fish are used. The fish are broken up into small pieces and then added to a pan with chopped onion and garlic and fried for a couple of minutes. A couple of beaten eggs and black pepper are added, and the omelette is served very thin and dry with a plate of crudités and rice.
Where: You’ll be hard pushed to find a better version than at Keur Keur Coffee Shop, #75 Street 118, Phnom Penh.
Grilled pork with rice and pickles
Dish: This is easily Cambodia’s best breakfast. There is something incredible in the way the pickled vegetables, chewy slices of grilled pork, and the clear pork broth work together with pickled chillies from the condiment trays. The pork is marinated for hours and then slowly grilled, and has a deliciously salty flavour and intense red colour. You pour spoonfuls of stock over the rice and pork and then dig in. The pickle is usually made from carrot, cucumber and daikon. They are cut on a mandolin into julienne strips and then salted. The water produced is drained off and then they are soused in a pickling mixture of water, vinegar, sugar, salt and spices. Think kimchi without all the PR.
Where: Any busy Khmer eatery at breakfast time. But get there before 10am – it’s usually all gone by then.