Vietnamese

Chinese celery has a wonderfully intense and rather wild flavor when eaten raw, which explains why it is always cooked before serving, as in this simple stir-fry. It looks like pencil-thin stems of Western celery with roots attached, and in a bunch, it could be mistaken for Italian parsley because the leaves are similar. At a Chinese or Viet market, choose Chinese celery that looks crisp and fresh (check the roots) and use it within a couple of days of purchase.

In classic stir-fries such as this one, beef, a special-occasion meat in Vietnam, is paired with a vegetable that is equally prized and costly. Here, it is cauliflower, traditionally considered a luxury vegetable in Vietnam because it used to be grown only in the cool areas around Dalat. To allow these precious ingredients to shine, they are treated simply with little sauce and only a few other ingredients. Taking a cue from Chinese cooks, I use flank steak for stir-frying. Cut across the grain into small pieces, it cooks up to an inimitable tenderness. To complement the beef, I select cauliflower that tastes sweet, looks dense, and feels heavy for its size.

I often pan-sear steaks Vietnamese style, with lots of garlic, black pepper, and Maggi Seasoning sauce, a favorite condiment of the Vietnamese. Thinly slice the steaks so guests may help themselves with chopsticks, plus the juices released are delicious mixed into a bowl of rice. Or, make the steaks part of a Western knife-and-fork meal (bit-tet is the Viet transliteration of the French bifteck) and serve with crispy fried potatoes instead of rice (see Stir-Fried Beef with Crispy Fried Potatoes, page 140, for guidance on cooking the potatoes).

In the Viet kitchen, preserved dried meats include not only Chinese sausages and jerky, but also these fine, salty pork shreds, named for their resemblance to cotton fibers. Mixed into a bowl of hot rice (add a pat of butter for richness) or creamy rice soup (page 67), the chewy shreds add savory depth to otherwise plain foods. They also turn up tucked into baguette sandwiches (page 34) or sprinkled atop rice crepe rolls (page 270). You may buy thit ruoc bong in tubs at Viet delis and Chinese markets (called pork sung or pork fu in Chinese), but I prefer to make my own. That way, there is no MSG and I know that quality ingredients were used. Eaten a little at a time, a batch lasts months. Use boneless pork loin that has been trimmed of any pearlescent silver skin and fat; Chinese markets often sell such well-trimmed cuts. Or, you can purchase a boneless center-cut pork loin roast, cut and trim the center portion, and reserve the balance for another use.

This recipe is my re-creation of a dish prepared by Le Thang, the chef and owner of the now-defunct Dong Ba restaurant in Little Saigon in Westminster, California. The modest eatery, named after the famous outdoor market in Hue, showcased the rustic dishes of central Vietnam, and although the mì Quang noodle soup and bánh bèo chén (rice pancakes steamed in small bowls) were superb, the minced pork was my favorite. Conceptually, this dish is similar to the recipe for Caramelized Minced Pork (page 131), but it takes on a distinctive central Vietnamese character from the bold use of lemongrass, chile, garlic, and shrimp sauce. Indeed, the generous amount of lemongrass acts as more of a main ingredient than a seasoning, while the chopped shrimp, roasted peanuts, and toasted sesame seeds add layers of flavor and texture. The result is salty, sweet, spicy, rich, and dangerously addictive. Enjoy this dish with plenty of rice, adding some cucumber to each bite for a cool and crunchy contrast.

Seventy-five years of French domination left many influences in the Viet kitchen. Because I grew up eating these stuffed tomatoes on a regular basis, it never crossed my mind that they were adapted from a traditional French idea. It should have: farci means “stuffed” in French and tô-mát is a Vietnamese transliteration of the French tomate. My edition of Larousse Gastronomique offers nine recipes for stuffing tomatoes. Here’s a tenth, flavored with a shot of fish sauce, of course. As a hybrid dish, these savory, slightly tangy tomatoes can be enjoyed with chopsticks as part of a traditional Viet dinner or with knife and fork as part of a Western-style meal. For the best results, select firm, slightly underripe tomatoes that will hold their shape nicely after cooking.

Simple to prepare, this traditional dish is meant to be eaten in small quantities with lots of rice. The pork cooks slowly in a skillet with salty-sweet seasonings until it starts rendering a little fat and turns reddish brown. The caramelized, crispy results recall the delicious bits that stick to the bottom of the pan when you sear meat. The final addition of scallion lends a touch of color. You can also eat this minced pork with com nam (page 241), cooked rice shaped by hand into compact balls or logs. When I was a child, my father used a wet dish towel to knead hot rice into thick logs, which he then let cool before slicing. My siblings and I would pick up a piece with our fingers, firmly press it against some of the minced pork, and eat it out of hand.

Smooth, well-seasoned meat and seafood pastes have many uses in the Vietnamese kitchen. Here, a pinkish orange salmon paste is shaped into small cakes before undergoing a two-step cooking process: an initial steaming to cook the cakes, followed by broiling, grilling, or frying to crisp the outside. The cakes are sliced and served as an appetizer or dunked into Simple Dipping Sauce (page 309) and eaten with rice for dinner. If you have enjoyed Thai fried fish cakes (tod mun), these will remind you of them. When my mother came to the States, she substituted salmon for the rich-tasting tuna she had used in Vietnam. I have since prepared the cakes with the ahi tuna available here, but the results were too firm and dry. The fattier salmon is superior. If you can’t find skinless salmon fillet, buy 2 1/3 pounds of skin-on fillet and remove the skin before you cut the fish into chunks. The cakes can be frozen after they are steamed and then thawed and crisped for a good last-minute meal or snack. The recipe is also easily halved, but I advise you to make the whole batch and tuck away the extras for when you need a quick dish.

This steamed fish recipe, given to our family by our Chinese Vietnamese friend Uncle Su, is special. During cooking, the bold seasonings mix with the sweet fish juices to create a wonderful sauce for flavoring the flesh and a bowl of hot rice. Fresh salmon steaks or fillets are a fine substitute for the heads, which my parents prefer. You can also try the sauce atop other moderately flavored fish that have some richness to their flesh, such as sablefish. Avoid lean, dense fish, such as halibut or swordfish, which dry out and toughen when steamed.

Cha gio, which originated in Saigon are among Vietnam’s national dishes. They are often misleadingly translated as spring rolls, because they seem like a riff on the Chinese spring roll, or as imperial rolls, a translation of pâté imperial, their French moniker. But these rolls are not reserved for royalty, nor are they exclusively eaten during the Spring Festival (Chinese New Year). And their filling, wrapper, and accompaniments are uniquely Vietnamese. Out of culinary pride, I encourage people to call these rolls cha gio, their southern Viet name. The rolls are made in varying sizes. Cooks with great manual dexterity create thumb-sized rolls. Lacking such skill and patience, I make stubby cigar-sized ones and cut them up before serving. Larger ones also involve less labor when frying up enough for a special lunch or dinner. Some Vietnamese American cooks use Filipino lumpia or Chinese spring roll wrappers, which are made of wheat flour and fry up crisp, but an authentic flavor is lost. For the best results, use rice paper made of all rice flour or of rice and tapioca flours.

Presented on a platter just moments out of the steamer, a whole steamed fish reflects the cook’s care and attention to obtaining the freshest ingredients possible. Ideally, the fish was plucked live from a tank at the market. Barring that, it met its end shortly before the cook selected it from a bed of ice. This recipe, with its mixture of pork, ginger, onion, mushrooms, and cellophane noodles, is one of the classic Viet ways to steam fish, with the various flavors and textures melding beautifully during cooking. The flavorings are light, so select a mild-tasting white-fleshed fish to complement them. I like striped bass, which is readily available and has delicate flesh, as well as bones that aren’t troublesome; a whole trout weighing about 1 1/2 pounds is another good option. The dish is perfect for entertaining because most of the work may be done hours in advance. Add White Tree Fungus in Clear Broth (page 76), a simply seasoned stir-fried vegetable, and rice for an elegant meal.

In Vietnam, the delicate anchovies (ca com) used for making fish sauce are also fried and enjoyed as a snack like a Spanish tapa or as part of a meal along with a simple soup, boiled or stir-fried vegetable, and rice. Even though these small fish are sold frozen at Viet markets, I like to use smelts, which are the perfect North American substitute. Delicate and sweet, they have soft, edible bones that allow you to “eat them like French fries,” as a fishmonger once told me. And the batter remains crispy long after the last fish is fried. Use the freshest smelts you can find or substitute other small fish available in your area, such as fresh anchovies.

Eating this crab is somewhat akin to eating a pile of barbecued ribs. Coated with a garlicky-sweet-spicy sauce, the crab requires a little work to get at all the delicious bits (and perhaps a cold beer to wash things down), but your effort pays off. Vietnamese cooks traditionally cut up live crabs before stir-frying them. That is a run-of-the-mill task for fearless types like my mom. Most cooks, however, wince at the thought of chopping up a live crustacean, especially one with large claws. To avoid getting pinched, I briefly boil the crab, which also sets the meat and tomalley, making the crab easy to take apart. Since freshness is crucial, use whatever kind of live crab is available in your area, the feistier the better for optimal flavor. Asian markets are typically reliable sources. In Northern California, I’m blessed with the large Dungeness crab. Outfit the table with metal nutcrackers, communal bowls for holding shells, and a finger bowl for each person.

This Vietnamese version of Chinese salt-and-pepper shrimp is bursting with bold flavors, and the high-heat searing seals in the juices. Use shrimp in their shells for the extra crunch and smokiness they develop during searing. Ideally their heads will be intact, too, as the juices trapped in the heads add to the richness of the finished dish. Purchase white shrimp with edible thin shells for this recipe; they are usually available at Asian and Latin markets.

This recipe was inspired by a grilled tuna steak that I ordered at a sleepy roadside restaurant in Vietnam. Working tableside on a small charcoal brazier, the young waiter cooked a half-inch-thick tuna steak with care and patience. Back in my home kitchen, I decided to adapt the recipe to the stove top. I find that pan searing allows greater control than grilling over the doneness of the lean, meaty steaks, yielding juicier results. There are no tricks here. The tuna steaks are coated with the same seasonings used for Grilled Shrimp and Squid (page 111), and the gingery dipping sauce offers a good contrast to the richness of the fish. Serve with Chicken Dumpling and Chrysanthemum Leaf Soup (page 61), boiled gailan (Chinese broccoli) or regular broccoli (which are both good with the dipping sauce), and rice.

Shrimp can be paired with strong flavors—in this case, a tangy and sweet tamarind sauce with a touch of heat—and still retain their briny character. The tartness of the tropical pod comes through in the sauce, but it is balanced by the other seasonings, just as it is in a well-prepared Indian tamarind chutney. These shrimp are at home with a bowl of rice for soaking up the sauce, but they also make an interesting cross-cultural hand roll tucked into a warm corn tortilla and eaten like a taco. As long as you have frozen cubes of tamarind liquid on hand, this recipe is quick to prepare.

A great way to cook shrimp is to grill them whole, with heads and shells intact. The unpeeled shrimp cook in their own juices, staying moist, and the shells pick up a little char, releasing a sweet, toasty aroma. Since I also like grilled squid, I often serve a mixed grill of squid and shrimp. Squid with tubes only about five inches long are especially tender. The best shrimp to grill are big white ones that have edible thin shells. To find them, head to an Asian market, where you will also find the squid. Before cooking the shrimp, follow Vietnamese tradition and neatly trim them. Then, cut the squid to create fringe that will curl back during grilling, to resemble trumpet flowers. I recommend cleaning the squid yourself because the flavor is superior to that of precleaned squid. To create a full menu, add one of the canh soups (pages 58 to 66) and some grilled summer squash (see the Note that accompanies Grilled Chicken on page 81).

These hand rolls are a simple and healthful do-it-yourself meal: you assemble the ingredients and invite guests to do the rest. It is a relaxing experience, with everyone making their own hand rolls, eating, sipping cold beverages, and chatting. In Vietnam, freshwater ca loc (snakehead fish) is often used for this dish, encased in clay and roasted in rice straw, wrapped in banana leaf and grilled over charcoal, or just placed directly on the grill. I prefer the simplicity of the last approach. Trout is the perfect substitute for ca loc, as its sweet flesh stands up well to grilling. The skin crisps wonderfully, too.

Most people are introduced to galangal, a relative of ginger, by way of Thai curries and seafood soups. The rhizome is seldom used in Vietnamese cooking, but when it is, it is paired with other bold-flavored ingredients. Here, its pungent heat brightens a northern fish kho, with the bittersweet caramel sauce tempering its fire. Use the smaller amount of galangal if you want a dish with less intensity. Although salmon isn’t native to Vietnam, it takes on the robust flavors of the kho remarkably well. Fresh side pork (pork belly), which you can find at Asian markets, is the stealth ingredient here, enrobing everything with its richness to create a unique surf-and-turf combination. The result is spicy, savory, and a touch sweet.

In this classic southern Vietnamese kho, catfish steaks are simmered for about an hour, which turns them a mahogany brown and gives them a deep savory flavor tinged with sweetness. You may enrich the dish with oil, though I prefer the old-world technique of my mom’s friend Mrs. Ly, who renders pork fat and simmers the cracklings with the fish. Buy a whole fresh catfish (about three pounds, gutted weight) at a Chinese, Southeast Asian, or Latin market and ask the fishmonger to cut it into one-inch-thick steaks. Use the center-cut steaks for this recipe and save the head, collar, and tail pieces to make Sour Fish Soup with Tamarind, Pineapple, and Okra (page 66), in place of the fillet. Serve the kho with the soup, a boiled green vegetable or Crunchy Pickled Bean Sprout Salad (page 193), and rice. For the best taste, combine a little piece of the fish, some rice, and a bit of sauce in each bite.