A Vietnamese Moment

Ingredients 3 lbs of ca hong (whole snapper fish) 1 large tomato a little white onion sugar fish sauce nuoc mam dua chua (pickled mustard greens) 1. In a large skillet add oil. Pan fry the fish until golden yellow. Turn over only once. 2. Thinly slice a small chunk of white onion and add to the skillet. Add to the sides off the fish (not on the fish). Let it caramelize a little and become fragrant. 3. Slice 1 large tomato into thin 1/4 inch slices. Add to the skillet. 4. Add 1-1.5 PS nuoc mam, 1/2 PS sugar, 1/8 tsp bot ngot, 1/4 tsp of bot nem ga). Stir lightly. 5. Turn fish over once. Cover fish with the seasonings. 6. Let the fish cook on low heat for about 10 mins. This will let the fish soak in the juices. 7. When the fish is almost done, add 2 handful bunches of pickled mustard greens. Let cook for another 2 mins on high heat and let fish soak up the juices. (optional: thinly slice green onions and add to the skillet)

Ingredients 1/2 lb of pork belly (thit ba roi) ~10 pieces of shrimp with head on (*cut the tails off and the heads diagonally - meaning cut the eyes off) sugar nuoc mam bot ngot bot nem ga 3 tiny small red onions (thinly slice) 1. Thinly slice pork belly into little strips.  2. In a large skillet, add a little bit of oil. Don't add too much b/c you'll get some oil from the pork belly fat. Add the meat on high heat for about 1 min. Then turn down the heat to and cover with a lid. 3. Let the pork belly cook for 3-5 mins.  4. Add 1 PS sugar, a little bot ngot, 1/8 tsp bot nem ga, 1 PS nuoc mam. Stir and recover. Cook until softens. This should take around 7 minutes.   5. Turn down the heat to low. Add the shrimp and stir. Stir occasionally until shrimp is pink. Then add pepper.  6. You don't want to stir too much b/c you want to let the juices come out of the shrimp heads. Adding/cooking the shrimp sh...

If you like your meat with potatoes, then you'll LOVE this dish. It's very flavorful which goes perfect with the tender cuts of filet mignon. This dish is noms noms noms. Slices of filet mignon are stir fried and then poured over a bed of fried potatoes and enjoyed with jasmine rice. Not exactly the healthiest dish but will definitely make you one happy camper.  Ingredients:  4-5 potatoes 1 lb of filet mignon meat maggi seasoning sugar pepper 7 cloves of garlic (minced) Preparing the meat 1. Slice filet mignon into thin slices.  2. In a bowl, add 1/8 PS bot nem ga, 1/3 PS sugar, a little MSG, 1/2 PS oyster sauce, 3/4 PS maggi seasoning, and 1/3 of the minced garlic.  3. Toss around and let marinate for 10-30 minutes. As this is marinating, move onto the next step (frying potatoes).  Frying the potatoes 1. Peel 4-5 potatoes. Slice potatoes into 1/4 slices.  2. In a skillet, add oil. On med-high heat, add potatoes and ...

Pretty much every Asian culture has their own variation of fried rice. Why? Because it's cheap, easy to make in bulk, and already includes rice. That basically satisfies the Asian stomach. My mom taught me her frice (fried rice) recipe. Fried rice tastes the best when you use day old rice. It tastes even better if you use day old rice that was made with less water. It's a multi-step process so I suggest breaking it down into parts and then mixing everything together again. Ingredients:  Mixed frozen veggies (corn, peas, carrots, green beans) 2-4 Chinese sausage links 1 lb lean pork mea t ( Thịt  nạc  vai - pork shoulder/butt ) 1/3 bag of Chinese BBQ Char Siu Seasoning 8-10 Shrimps Small red onion (thinly slice) Sugar Maggie seasoning Salt Bot nem ga (chicken buillion granules) 6 Eggs Bot Ngot (MSG) 2-3 cups of day old rice (BEST if you make rice with little water and keep it for a day) Making the bbq pork (make this in advance as it must marinate for...

There are a couple variations of this recipe. Rau muong (water spinach) is a simple vegetable dish that goes great with fried fish or meat. In Vietnam, this was once a staple vegetable of the poor. Now, it's present in many Vietnamese cuisines as a garnish, side dish, or main ingredient. No matter how you decide to stir fry your water spinach, you must start with blanching the rau muong. Food is blanched to soften, or to party or fully cook it, or to remove a strong taste. Blanching is the process in which you plunge food (can be done with fruit, veggies, pasta) into boiling water and then remove after a brief interval. Food is then submerged in iced water or washed under cold water. Placing it under cold water effectively haltens the cooking process. Ingredients: 1 big bunch of water spinach 2-3 cloves of garlic Oil Red bird's eye chili pepper (optional) sugar bot nem ga fish sauce (variation 1) maggi seasoning (variation 2) Blanching the water spinach 1. ...

HEO YEAH :) Get it?!! Thit heo kho chung is something I grew up with. It's very savory and the perfect dish for when I'm craving meat and eggs. This isn't my mom's recipe (I'll get that someday!). It's actually my cousin's - who I think is a better cook than my mom. She lives about two hours from us though so I don't see her often but when she visited, I asked her to show me how to make this. This is a multi-step dish that takes HOURS to make. If you have a lot of free time, or will be spending the day at home doing miscellanious things, then this is a great dish to make. It takes around 2-3 hours to make. Braised pork (or braised any type of meat) means to first sear or blanch the meat and then simmered in very little liquid on low heat over a long period of time. The outcome is very tender meat that falls off the bone or falls apart in your mouth. 3 lb pork meat (some with bone, a little fatty) 10 small red onion 4 cloves of ...

Hi guys, I know it's been a while since my last post. I know you've been eagerly waiting to see what concoctions I've been making. Well, wait no more! I'm back with a bunch of new recipes. :) I learned this recipe from my aunt. She learned it from a woman who learned it from another woman who got it from another woman. Needless to say, it's a well known Vietnamese recipe. Actually, I've never had this dish before my aunt showed me how to make it. There is a variation of it (which I will post soon) that I'm more familiar with but this dish is just as tasty. It cooks REALLY fast, you're done in 15 minutes, tops! It's great for when you're short on time but have a big appetite. 10-15 shrimp; about 1 lb (some peeled and some unpeeled or whatever your preference is) nuoc mam salt pepper sugar 2 green onions (cut lengthwise into 1.5 inch sections) 1/2 small red onion 1/4 small white onion (cut into small half moon-like rings) 3 cloves of ...

Okay, I know this next recipe isn't Vietnamese... but it's French. And the French occupied Vietnam for over 100 years. And Vietnamese people love egg-based desserts. Does that count? Whatever, this is my blog and I can do whatever I want. :) I wanted a place to store my creme brûlée recipe so decided to put it on this site. This comes from experimenting with several other recipes and finally coming up with something I like. It's a very basic recipe and I change it based on my mood. 2 cups heavy cream 5 egg whites 1/3-1/4 cup of sugar 1 tsp of vanilla extract some brown sugar (to carmelize the top) 1. Boil water. 2. In small pot, heat 2 cups of heavy cream, 1 tsp of vanilla extract, and 1/4 cup of sugar. You can add more sugar if you want more sweetness. Stir and heat until you see steam rising from the mixture. 3. Beat egg whites until it forms small peaks at the end of your whisk and slowly add to the heated cream mixture. Taste it and add a little bit of suga...

I've been making an effort to blog more recipes... hopefully over the next few months, I get all the recipes I want from my mom. I haven't had much practice in making these dishes on my own though because I don't like to eat my own cooking (weird, I know). My next step is perfecting these dishes... hopefully I can make my boyfriend or dad eat whatever the heck it is I make. Anyway, this dish is present at many Chinese restaurants. It's super easy and quick to make... seriously, this is done in 10 minutes! The only thing is - I don't think I translated the name into English correctly... will update when I find out what the English name is! Ingredients: 1 large bag of snow pea shoots (the market I went to didn't have snow pea shoots so I bought pea sprouts instead... tasted exactly the same! I think they are the same...) Bot nem ga (chicken broth) 9 cloves of garlic Fish Sauce (optional) Oyster Sauce 1. In a large skillet, heat cooking oil on low/mediu...

Here Danh - it's one of the recipe's you've been asking and asking me for. So here it is.... you're welcome!! I had to endure mom for 2 hours for this -___-; one hour to get the recipe and another hour for that 2 mile night walk she made me go on with her. You owe me. Anyway, this is a savory egg pancake that you can eat with rice. I know what you're thinking... eggs... as a meal?? But this is actually a pretty hearty entree. Not sure if it's considered a "pancake" or some type of Vietnamese omelette. Ingredients: 1 lb of minced pork 20 medium shrimp (peeled) 1 small bag of vermicelli (about 1.7 oz) 3 small red onions 1/2 large white onion fish sauce sugar pepper bot nem ga (chicken broth) 12-13 large eggs 1. So, let's start with prepping the vermicelli. You want to soften the vermicelli (thin-white noodles) by soaking/washing it in room temperature water (or cold, whatever) for about five minutes. Dry in a colander. With scissors,...