Laping is a spicy cold mung bean noodle dish in Tibetan and Nepalese.
Its a street food. It can be eaten with red pepper chili, cilantro and green onion sauce. The noodles have a slippery texture and are served with a soy sauce gravy. It is traditionally a summer food.
Heat the mixture on stove top to medium, stirring frequently, for 8-9 minutes, or until the mixture is so thick you can barely stir it. If the mixture is boiling before it thickens, turn down the heat until it stops boiling. When done the texture will be very thick, almost like jello, but it still needs to set.
Transfer the cooked mixture into a clean bowl and let it sit overnight at room temperature. In order to shorten the time for cooling, it can also be placed in the refrigerator for 4-5 hours.
After the laping has set, remove it from the bowl. It should stand up by itself, like a very firm jello.
In Tibet, people grate the laping with a very large grater, but our grater was too small and didn’t really work, so we did what many Tibetans do, and just cut the laping with a large knife into long strips.
Note:
Its a street food. It can be eaten with red pepper chili, cilantro and green onion sauce. The noodles have a slippery texture and are served with a soy sauce gravy. It is traditionally a summer food.
Ingredients for the Laping
- 1 cup of potato or mung-bean starch (For the images here we used potato starch, but we’ve also made it with mung bean starch, and those noodles turn out much stiffer, which you may like, as a matter of personal taste. Mung-bean starch can be found in Korean stores and some other Asian markets.)
- 5 cups of water
Ingredients for the Sauce
- 7 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 stalk green onion, chopped
- ¼ cup cilantro, chopped
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon rice vinegar
- ¼ cup sesame oil
- ¼ cup soy sauce
- ¼ cup crushed dried red pepper (We bought this at an Asian store. If you can’t find this, you can cut up dried red pepper, or use chili powder, or a bit of chili sauce. )
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Preparing the Clear Noodles
Before heating, stir the starch and water together until you get an even texture.Heat the mixture on stove top to medium, stirring frequently, for 8-9 minutes, or until the mixture is so thick you can barely stir it. If the mixture is boiling before it thickens, turn down the heat until it stops boiling. When done the texture will be very thick, almost like jello, but it still needs to set.
Transfer the cooked mixture into a clean bowl and let it sit overnight at room temperature. In order to shorten the time for cooling, it can also be placed in the refrigerator for 4-5 hours.
After the laping has set, remove it from the bowl. It should stand up by itself, like a very firm jello.
In Tibet, people grate the laping with a very large grater, but our grater was too small and didn’t really work, so we did what many Tibetans do, and just cut the laping with a large knife into long strips.
Prepare the Sauce and Combine with Noodles
- Mince 7 cloves of garlic
- Chop 1 stalk green onion
- Chop ¼ cup cilantro
- Combine garlic, onion and cilantro with 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon rice vinegar, ¼ cup sesame oil, ¼ cup soy sauce, and ¼ cup crushed dried red pepper in a small bowl and stir well. This amount of pepper makes it VERY spicy. If you’re not accustomed to spicy food, just add the pepper in very small increments until you hit the right amount for you.)
- Drizzle the sauce over the laping, then mix gently with a spatula or other flat utensil until the laping is well-coated with the sauce.
Note:- Strips of cucumber make a fresh, crunchy addition.
- Some readers have reported success also with using corn starch and potato starch if you don’t have mung bean starch.
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