Viet World Kitchen

Master Banh Mi Sandwich Recipe

I've posted several times about Vietnamese banh mi but realized that I'd never presented a full-fledged, master recipe,  nor have I provided some history about the popular Vietnamese snack.  First off, a bit about sandwiches themselves. Thank heavens for John Montagu (1718-1792), 4th Earl of Sandwich, who habitually sent for cold meat in between two slices of bread so that he wouldn't have to break away from the gambling tables to eat. Little did he know how he'd impact global eating practices, let alone that of a small country like Vietnam!

There is essentially one sandwich in Vietnamese cooking and it is quite a tour de force. It started out very simply, with baguette smeared with liver pate and that was it. That's how my mom knew it in the 1940s when she was growing up in Northern Vietnam. What we know today as banh mi is a light, crispy small baguette that is split and hollowed before it is invariably filled with homemade mayonnaise or butter (which I don't like), sliced chili pepper, cilantro leaves, cucumber, a tangy-sweet daikon and carrot pickle (do chua), and a drizzle of soy sauce. The variation comes in when you choose what protein component(s) will be center stage. The classic version, banh mi thit nguoi—referred to as the "special" (dac biet) at Vietnamese delis, includes a smearing of housemade liver pâté and thin slices of various Vietnamese cold cuts. Other filling options include, but are not limited to, roasted chicken, grilled pork, crunchy julienned pork skin (bì), Chinese char siu pork, and tofu. This delicious, fanciful version was popularized by Southern Vietnamese, particularly those in Saigon, and is what we know abroad today and in most of Vietnam too.

In the early 1980s, these sandwiches occupied the food craze spotlight in the Vietnamese-American community. A sandwich war of sorts ensued in Little Saigon, California, where entrepreneurial deli owners posted banners advertising low prices ($1 or $1.25) and special offers like "Buy 2 Get 1 Free". Word spread about who had the best deal and best product. There were light-hearted squabbles over which deli should have your loyalty. Our family, like other folks who can't resist a good bargain, bought a dozen sandwiches at a time—veggies on the side so that the bread wouldn't get soggy on the way home. After eating and analyzing a fair number of so-so sandwiches (you eventually get what you pay for), we started making them ourselves—the genesis of this banh mi recipe.

Daikon and Carrot Pickle Recipe (Do Chua)

“Dilly the Pickle” emailed last week to announce that the 2009 International Pickle Week goes from May 15 to 25 (pickleweek.com). That' s more like 11/2 weeks, but I didn't care because I’m a sucker for cute cartoon icons and pickles of any kind, so I looked in the fridge for my go-to Vietnamese pickle – do chua made of tangy sweet daikon and carrot. This ubiquitous Vietnamese pickle is what’s stuffed into banh mi sandwiches, served alongside morsels such as grilled beef in wild betel leaf (thit bo la lot), and added to salads.

Sadly, my jar of daikon and carrot pickle was mostly brine and a few floating white and orange sticks of vegetables. Oye, what kind of respectable Vietnamese cook was I? It’s not so much that it is national pickle week, but rather that pickles play an important role at the Vietnamese table. They provide textural and flavor contrasts to food. For example, the flavor of rich foods gets cut (mitigated) by a tart-sweet pickle. At Tet Lunar New Year celebrations, you always see several kinds of pickles on the menu as that’s a holiday where lots of fatty dishes are served. In banh mi sandwiches, the daikon and carrot offer a crunch that pairs well with the baguette and the tartness offsets the savory rich meats and mayonnaise. But Vietnamese cooks, like their Asian brethren, prefer to make what I call fast pickles.  

Reinventing Banh Mi in New York - NYT Article

There are two popular foods in the Viet repertoire -- things that whether you're an insider or outsider, you know and love: pho noodle soup and banh mi sandwiches. They both appeared in the Vietnamese culinary scene around the turn of the 20th century, and are a mix of Eastern and Westnern cultures, the embodiment of Vietnam. We were fusion and hybrid before those terms were applied to food and cars!

Banh mi baguette sandwiches have been tweaked countless ways over the years, with Jalapenos added in the U.S., for example. What we know now as banh mi was originally a southern Vietnamese (Saigon) version. Folks like my mother and father knew banh mi as warm baguette with pate or just salt and pepper!

I've written in the past about new incarnations of Vietnamese banh mi and many of you have chimed in. Now, New Yorkers are getting a dose of nouveau banh mi. While there are traditional versions of banh mi sandwiches in Chinatown, in hipster places like Brooklyn and other locales,  you'll find crazy new ones filled with the ingredients for pho, sloppy Joes, and even polish sausages. Last week, New York Times reporter Julia Moskin and I chatted about the evolution of banh mi in New York City for her story:

Building on Layers of Tradition, Julia Moskin (New York Times, 4/8/09)
Notes: For homemade banh mi, Julia included a recipe for pickled daikon and carrot from my book, Into the Vietnamese Kitchen.

Mayo or butter? One of the things that Julia and I discussed was the use of mayonnaise versus butter to moisten the bread. I prefer whole fat, whole egg mayonnaise, and some folks gussy it up with butter. In Vietnam, butter is very expensive but you can easily make good mayonnaise with fresh eggs and oil, readily available ingredients. Are you a mayo or butter person?  

Old or new? Your thoughts on traditional versus 'new' banh mi?

For a final shout out -- note how both Cathy Danh of Gastronomy Blog and I were both included in the story. Very cool.

Use the banh mi recipe to make your own!

Easy Homemade Mayonnaise

Last week I taught a cooking class at Sur La Table in San Francisco. On the menu were Vietnamese banh mi sandwiches. At home, I typically use whole egg (full fat!) mayonnaise. However, for the class I wanted to offer students a super authentic experience. So we made fresh mayonnaise. I used to make mayonnaise from scratch when I was a kid and our family was in a homemade banh mi jag, and then lots more when I worked at City restaurant in Los Angeles. Making mayonnaise is not a regular thing for me these days, but when I revisited and started tinkering with homemade mayonnaise last week, I rediscovered that it’s gosh darn easy to make.

Vietnamese Meatball Sandwich Recipe (Banh Mi Xiu Mai)

Vietnamese banh mi sandwiches may feature a whole host of things, as long as they're boldly flavored with lots of garlicky or savory goodness. Lary from San Diego, CA, wrote asking about a meatball version called banh mi xiu mai. I was not familiar with such a thing and was befuddled by the xiu mai in the name, which suggests that the sandwich contains the popular Cantonese dumpling served at dim sum. The other day at Charles Phan's Out the Door in San Francisco, I noted that they were sold out of their version of a meatball banh mi. It's hard to keep up with all the deliciously wacky things that Vietnamese cooks invent.

Turns out it's just a Vietnamese version of an Italian meatball sandwich that stopped briefly in southern China. Lary found a recipe on the funky Khmerkrom website and tweaked it a bit. He sent me the original, and I edited his contribution for easier reading and present it here for you.

Recipe

Vietnamese Meatball Sandwich
Banh Mi Xiu Mai

Meatballs:
1 pound ground pork
1 large egg
3 cloves garlic, minced
½ cup minced green onion
½ cup minced jicama
½ tablespoon cornstarch
½ tablespoon Wondra flour
½ tablespoon fish sauce
½ tablespoon soy sauce
½ tablespoon sugar
½ teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon whole black pepper

Sauce:
½ cup water
½ tablespoon cornstarch
½ tablespoon sugar
½ tablespoon soy sauce
½ teaspoon salt
8 ounces canned tomato sauce
1 tablespoons canola oil
1 cloves garlic, minced
½ tablespoon sugar
1 scallion, chopped
½ teaspoon black pepper
Light sprinkling of garlic powder
Light sprinkling of onion powder
Light sprinkling of ginger powder

1. Combine all the meatball ingredients in a large bowl and mix well with your hands. Use your hands to form meat balls, putting each in a glass or metal bowl, put it in a steamer and steam over boiling water until cooked, about 40 minutes. [This seems like a long time. I would check after 15 minutes, assuming that the meatballs about 1 inch wide. - Andrea]

2. For the sauce, in a small bowl, mix the water with the cornstarch, sugar, soy sauce, salt and tomato sauce. Stir to combine well and set aside.

3. In a small saucepan over high heat, heat the oil. Add the garlic and cook for about 30 seconds, until aromatic. Add the water and tomato sauce mixture and stir until the sauce has thickened.

4. To make a sandwich, slice the meatballs in half and put inside the French bread. Spoon the tomato sauce atop the meatballs. Finish with some pickled daikon and carrot and a few sprigs of cilantro.

Original recipe posted at: http://www.khmerkromrecipes.com/recipes/recipe49.htm

Banh Mi Incarnations

Vietnamese banh mi is a sandwich that's constantly being reinvented and reinterpreted. For example, at David Chang's acclaimed Momofuku Ssam Bar in Manhattan, there's a version that sells for $9. The bread was a bit too crusty hard for me, the pickles rather flaccid, and the three-meat terrine was unfortunately nondescript that evening. Nevertheless, I appreciated his interpretation as a sign that Vietnamese food is part of the current gourmet hipster food culture. Chang has a Viet-American chef among his staff to boot, which perhaps explains Momofuku's roasted Brussel sprouts tossed with nuoc mam fish sauce --  an addictive salty-sweet-spicy-pungent treat. (Note: When I used the Gourmet recipe (linked above), my cooking time was half of their estimate. The oven is hot so keep an eye on the Brussel sprouts or they'll be toast.)

Sunset Magazine's November issue included a post-Thanksgiving version of banh mi that was essentially a spicy turkey and cabbage salad stuffed into a toasted roll. Their Vietnamese-style turkey subs called for chili garlic sauce (tuong ot toi) and no mayonnaise to soften the blow so watch out for the heat and vinegar blast!

If you've eaten banh mi these days -- either in Vietnam or abroad - there's a meatball version called banh mi xiu mai. Check Noodlepie's page on banh mi in Vietnam and you'll see that there are many fans of that version.  I'm not one of them, and have never made one myself, though there's a xiu mai recipe  that you may want to try it out!

Regardless, why deny people who love the Vietnamese-Chinese-Italian blending. Blake Killian at the Serious Eats website, recently posted on a banh mi sao [sic] mai that competed in the  New Orleans Po' Boy Preservation Festival for best po' boy.

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a link to Brigitte Nguyen's $2,000 Vietnamese pork burger, which was a Vietnamese sandwich in a bun.  Inspired by Brigitte, Chuck created and posted a spectacular looking Vietnamese pulled pork recipe on his Sunday Nite Dinner blog. He topped a burger bun with the tasty-looking pork.

Now how about putting that pulled pork in a baguette or bolillo roll with all the usual banh mi  suspects. Here's what you'll need and how to do it: 

• nice light baguette, split, toasted and insides gutted
• whole egg mayonnaise (don't skimp on the fat), smear the inside of the toasted baguette with mayo
• soy sauce or Maggi Seasoning sauce, give the bread a shot of the brown condiment of choice for savory depth

Then add the meat and tuck in the following:

• daikon and carrot pickle (do chua)
• cucumber strips (seeds removed)
• cilantro sprigs
• thinly sliced jalapeno (resist chili garlic sauce because it overwhelms)

Cut it in half and eat. Delish. For more details, check the banh mi recipe page.

If you have banh mi inventions of your own, let us know!