Luang Prabang Market, Laos

I've been to quite a few local markets by now, but the one I visited with my Lao cooking class in Luang Prabang was much more 'authentic' than the others. Please be warned this post isn't for the weak stomached. However, don't think that I am making fun of the use of all parts of the animal - I actually think it is quite admirable. I don't like waste.

Pork feet to the left, skinned pork jowls to the right and up top are cubes of congealed pigs blood

Plate of organs

Chicken feet

Small Frogs

Pork faces (skin only)

They're lookin' at you! More pork jowls.

These fruits are delicious - top are lychees, left are mangosteens, on the right are rambutans (like a lychee on the inside).

On the top are red bags of blood and on the bottom of the pile are green bags of bile

Guinea pigs (not pets).

Dried fish strung together with bamboo and banana leaves on the left

The two barrels in the top of the image are fermented fish sauce. Our instructor told us the more flies, the better the fish sauce, as it improves with age. I tried some and decided they must snicker at our clear bottled liquid fish sauce in the 'world foods' section of the grocery store, because theirs is intense..... really really intense.

Fertilized chicken eggs. The number written on the eggs represents the stage in development of the embryo inside the egg. One represents the youngest and three is about to hatch...... see the illustration.

This is a mixed pile of dried up animals - some rats, small birds, large birds and another unidentifable creatures. They looked a bit like old road kill. They are used to flavor soups and eaten bones and all.

Last, but not least, this one goes out to all my cardiology lab friends.... bottled pigs fat.