Lahp Moo or The Pork Roast that lived on

My one and a half year-old daughter demanded seconds of this dish.  Really.

It began as a pork roast I made a few nights ago for Chad and the kids to eat while I was at work.  I heard she ate her pork like crazy, but of course she liked the applesauce even better.  Fast forward a couple of days, and there is half of a roast sitting in my fridge.  What to do?  We had planned on turning the rest of the roast into BBQ sammies, but that just wasn't quite challenging enough: slice pork, add barbecue sauce, heat.  So, I consulted one of my favorite cookbooks, Quick & Easy Thai, and found a recipe for lahp moo, a pork sort-of-salad reminiscent of larb.  The recipe was written for ground pork, which of course was to be cooked as part of the recipe, and not already roasted beforehand.  I decided the roast would turn thai. 

I put the roast (cover eyes and press on) into the food processor and ground it up.  The deed was done, and we would have no barbecue sandwiches for dinner.  In my enthusiasm (it's working!), I left the food processor on a little teeny bit too long, so my pork was a little too ground up for my taste, but the end result was delicious anyway.  All of the thai flavors I love were there: the sweet, salty, the spicy, and the sour.

Don't toss your leftovers, people!

The approximate recipe for this dish:  Grind up your leftover pork roast in the food processor*, but not too much!  You want it to look about like cooked ground beef, texture-wise.  Season with the juice of two or three limes, a couple of tablespoons of fish sauce, a couple of tablespoons of sugar, crushed red pepper to taste, chopped mint, chopped green onions and a couple of tablespoons of thinly sliced shallots.  Toast a few tablespoons of raw rice in a dry skillet over medium high heat until it begins to turn golden brown.  Process the rice until it is pretty fine, and toss it into the pork mixture.  Serve with chopped tomatoes and cabbage leaves, and of course some sriracha on the side!

*If your pork looks a little too fatty (mushy), then try putting it into a frying pan with a tablespoon or so of hot oil and cooking it for a few minutes.