True to its name, this leaf salad is all… leaves. Just one dish but the tray is full, because “real” leaf salad has up to 40-50 types, from familiar vegetables such as: mustard leaves, perilla, ginseng, fig leaves, perilla leaves, onions, basil… to types of leaves that rarely appear in meals such as: mango leaves, guava leaves, sour leaves, star gooseberry leaves, ivy… and many types of leaves that are unique to the Central Highlands that many people do not know all the names of.
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| Kon Tum leaf salad |
In the middle of the “leaf tray” is a plate of side dishes. Boiled pork belly, thinly sliced so that the fat and meat are just right, not too greasy. A few slices of carp, boiled shrimp, pork skin. Especially, there is a plate of whole peppercorns, salt. The most special and elaborate thing about this leaf salad is the dipping sauce made from sticky rice, dried shrimp, pork belly, fermented rice, and satay.
Enjoying this dish also requires style, do not rush to “grab” all the leaves but follow the correct process. First, take mustard leaves or perilla leaves as the wrappers, then add sour leaves and a few other leaves depending on the diner’s choice, roll into a small funnel, put the pork belly, shrimp, pork skin… into the “funnel”, be sure to add pepper and salt, a little dipping sauce. Each time you roll the leaves, you use different types of leaves, creating different flavors, sometimes sour mango leaves, sometimes rich fig leaves, bitter guava leaves.
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Kontum Foods