Cooking for a big crowd. When we arrived around 9.00, a group of people were already cooking up a storm, the men outside, doing a sour bamboo soup, and the women inside working on a big Sa.
The thing about Lao cooking that struck me is that 'cooking is fun', and you do it with your friends and family. No solitary cook in the kitchen while the rst sit elsewhere, no, it is a community effort.

The recipes for this and more description of the process are being published in the next few days on our Lao food blog : http://www.foodfromnorthernlaos.com