Viet World Kitchen

Grilled Whole Fish in Banana Leaf Recipe (Ikan Panggang)

Banana leaf is not merely nature’s placemat. Asian cooks use it like plastic wrap, foil, and parchment paper. The beauty of using banana leaf is that it imparts a wonderful tea-leaf like scent to food during the cooking process. It’s kinda like the Southeast Asian version of French cooking en papillote (in paper)!

In the Vietnamese kitchen, banana leaf perfumes silky sausages and headcheese and many dumplings. But we seldom wrap large whole fish in banana leaf and grill it like our Southeast Asian brothers and sisters tend to do. Fresh lotus leaves, which are huge and easy to wrap with, is more typically used. Or, you use mud to encase the whole fish, usually freshwater snakehead fish (ca loc in Vietnamese). Or, you just grill the fish in a wire frame basket.

But who has fresh lotus leaves and mud at their disposal? Or the right size wire basket? Not me.

The other night, I thought of a wonderful lunch of grilled whole fish that I enjoyed with Robyn Eckhardt and David Hagerman in Kuala Lumpur in 2008. It was served with a briny-spicy-sweet dipping sauce made of funky shrimp paste, sweet kecap manis soy sauce, and chiles. A terrific harmony of Malaysian ingredients.

Wanting to recapture those flavors, I found a similar recipe in Christopher Tan’s Singaporean cookbook, Shiok! Chris is among the leading experts on Southeast Asian foodways and I trust him immensely. His ikan panggang recipe was modestly called “Barbecued Fish” in English. The flavors were fabulously big. I’ve adapted Chris’s recipe here for you.

How to Cook Dried Bamboo Shoot (Mang Kho)

Several people have emailed asking about how to cook dried bamboo shoot. I looked up the familiar Asian ingredient in all my books but for some reason, dried bamboo shoot is seldom mentioned in Asian cookbooks. It is a terrific and standard ingredient sold at Chinese and Vietnamese markets. Dried bamboo shoot is shelved at Asian grocery stores alongside other dried foodstuffs, such as dried mushroom, seaweed, turnip, squid, beans, etc. In Vietnam, the shoots are simmered along with pork, duck, or chicken for a classic rice noodle soup called bun mang. Such preparations are traditionally saved for special occasions, such as the Lunar New Year – Tet Nguyen Dan. Since Tet is coming up (in 2010, it falls on Valentine's Day!), I cooked up a bunch of dried bamboo shoot today in preparation for the holiday cooking ahead.

What is the difference between fresh and dried bamboo shoot? Fresh has a crispness whereas dried has a meaty quality. Both have that musty bamboo funk but since bamboo shoot has to be cooked for a long time, the funk disappears. Bamboo shoot is called mang (“mahng”) in Vietnamese and dried bamboo shoot is mang kho (“mahng koh”). Dried bamboo shoots are not hard, but rather leathery. Once reconstituted and boiled until chewy-tender, dried bamboo shoots have a chewy-tenderness and pleasant sweetness that’s not found in fresh or canned bamboo. Whenever I cook dried bamboo shoot, I marvel at how it transforms its cooking broth into a perfumy brew. If you’ve had Japanese ramen noodle soup, chances are that you’ve had dried bamboo shoot (called menma) as a topping. 

Spicy Umami Ketchup Recipe

I’ve been on a condiment jag lately, if you haven’t noticed. With Labor Day weekend coming up, I’ve been dreaming of the summer’s last official barbecue – hamburgers. I love hamburgers and when we were kids, my mom would sometimes fry up burgers in a cast iron skillet and we’d gobble them up on Sunday mornings after church. To me, homemade burgers were nearly as good as homemade beef pho noodle soup. It’s no coincidence that both are ‘have it your way’ kinds of foods.

Like Vietnamese pho and banh mi sandwiches, I like to personalize my hamburgers, dressing it with carefully layered accoutrements before taking my first bite. On the bottom half of the bun, lots of rich mayonnaise touching both sides of the sliced tomato. On the top half of the bun, the tomato ketchup should flavor the meat, onion and cheese with its tangy, salty, heady edge. Ketchup punctuates a hamburger with brightness.

I’ve tackled homemade mayonnaise, Vietnamese chile garlic sauce, and Thai-style Sriracha sauce but I didn’t think of making ketchup myself until I noticed Saveur magazine's umami ketchup recipe in the September 2009 issue.  The fanciful ketchup recipe comes from the popular Umami Burger restaurant in Los Angeles. What made it umami? For one, ripe tomatoes are extremely umami laden, and the restaurant includes oyster sauce, tamari, Worcestershire sauce, and anchovies for extra savory depth.  The use of salty, briny ingredients in the recipe reminded me of traditional Vietnamese tomato sauces employed to nap fried whole fish, tofu and the like. In fact, in Rick Stein’s travel show on Vietnam, he makes that kind of sauce, seasoning it with fish sauce for savoriness. Stein uses fish sauce just like a Vietnamese cook would. Ketchup’s East-West connection got me to thinking and researching.

Fiery Hmong Chile, Cilantro, and Tomato Salsa Recipe

“Whatever I eat, I have to have a little chile with it,” the Hmong farmer’s son told me last Saturday at my local farmer’s market. “Especially with grilled meat, a little chile is so nice.” His sisters standing nearby all nodded in agreement.

I was picking through their pile of hot Thai chiles looking for nice red ones when we started the conversation. Summer is the peak season for Southeast Asian produce and Hmong farmers from California’s Central Valley flush our markets with super fresh leafy greens, all kinds of eggplant, several types of basil, lemongrass, and lots of chiles. I grow my own chiles but they aren’t ripe yet so I lay in a supply grown by the Hmong farmers. (Chiles freeze well so go crazy!)

“What do you do with the chiles?” I asked, thinking of a little something I could serve with our July 4 surf-and-turf grilled dinner. He obliged by describing this recipe, which is essentially like Hmong kua txob tuav xyaw dos (chile mashed with scallion). I know a tad about Hmong cooking this because I researched and wrote a 2007 Saveur article on Hmong farmers and Hmong home cooking. Don’t even try to figure out how to pronounce the Hmong name! Find a Hmong-speaking person to ask.

This is a relish – often described as a salsa by Hmong Americans – and you can serve it along with grilled pork, beef, chicken, shrimp, etc. I particularly like it with Vietnamese grilled lemongrass pork (thit heo nuong xa). If you like, dip a little sticky rice into this fiery masth, or stir it into food. You can just pound the chiles, salt, scallion and cilantro together if you don’t have tomato around. It’s quick and simple everyday Hmong condiment that’s dynamite. Feel free to vary the amount of chiles according to your tolerance for heat.

Makes about 1 cup

18 small or 9 medium Thai chiles, stemmed and chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 ½ teaspoons fish sauce
1/2 cup chopped scallion, green part only
1/2 lightly packed cup chopped cilantro
1 cup quartered ripe cherry tomato
Lime juice

1. Put the chiles, salt, and fish sauce into a mortar. With a circular motion of the pestle, crush the ingredients against the sides of the mortar into a rough mixture.

2. Add the scallion and cilantro, and switch to an up and down pounding motion with the pestle to combine the flavors well and reduce the mixture to a damp, rough mixture. Add the cherry tomatoes and lightly pound to combine. Taste and add lime juice as needed for a tart bite. Transfer to a small dish and serve.

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.  

Vietnamese Scallion Oil Garnish Recipe (Mo Hanh)

How can two ingredients add up to so much? I’m always amazed when I make this quick little Vietnamese garnish. It adds a richness and bright green finish to foods such as banh beo rice pancakes, banh hoi rice noodles, and rice paper rolls (e.g., salad/summer rolls). Use mo hanh the day you make it or the color dissipates from verdant to dull green. The flavor though, remains more or less the same.

Scallion Oil Garnish
Mo Hanh

Makes about 1/2 cup

4 scallions, white and green parts, thinly sliced (1 cup)
1/4 cup canola oil

1. Have the scallions ready in a bowl so they may be quickly added to the oil. In a small saucepan, heat the oil over medium heat until hot. Test the oil by dropping in a scallion slice; it should sizzle on contact. Add the scallions, and stir immediately to expose them quickly to the oil. When the scallions have collapsed and are soft, after about 30 seconds.

2. The garnish will keep for several hours at room temperature. Or, cover and refrigerate for up to 7 days, then bring to room temperature before using.

Note: This recipe was originally published in Into the Vietnamese Kitchen (Ten Speed Press, 2006)

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.

Ginger Lime Dipping Sauce (Nuoc Mam Gung)

Nuoc mam gung is one of the classic Vietnamese dipping sauces. No, it's not nuoc cham all the time with Vietnamese cooking. We've got a zillion kinds of dipping sauces to go with our foods.  Many cooks skimp on the ginger but I love the jolt of it, with the bracing qualities of the lime, muted slightly by a touch of sugar. If you want extra heat, add chiles. I've had a friend drink this sauce.

Pair it with seafood, especially deep fried catfish. It's also the dipping sauce for robustly flavored dishes such as steamed stuffed snails (oc nhoi) and panfried stuffed squid (muc nhoi). Even simple foods such as poached chicken or chicken rice soup (chao ga) benefits from the tangy-hot-sweet flavors of this sauce.

RECIPE

Ginger Lime Dipping Sauce
Nuoc Mam Gung

Makes about 2/3 cup

Chubby 2-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and minced
5 tablespoons fresh lime juice (2 or 3 limes)
2 1/2 tablespoons sugar
2 to 3 tablespoons fish sauce

In a small bowl, combine the ginger, lime juice, and sugar and stir to dissolve the sugar. Taste and adjust the flavors with more lime sugar or sugar as needed. The ginger and lime should both be prominent, but not to the point that they make you wince and pucker. Add the fish sauce, starting out with 2 tablespoons and adding more as your palate dictates. Set aside for 30 minutes to let the ginger bloom before serving.