This section is devoted the the culinary art of Vietnamese.

[ soup ] [ salad ] [ grilled or baked ] [ sauteed and fried ] [ rice ] [ dessert ]

According to Duong Thi Thanh Lien in "Vietnamese Dishes," "cooking is a "time consuming job" because at a party we serve many courses at the same time, and food should be completed ready at the table when served. We do not serve knives and forks. We have bowls with saucers, chopsticks, spoons, and small plates for fish sauce (nuoc mam). Meats and vegetables must be chopped in advance. We mash or grind meat, fish, shrimp, beans, rice with the traditional grinder. It would be much easier with an electric blender. In the old times, to keep food, we had to season it, make it salty and to wrap it with banana leaves, because we did not have refrigerators or freezers. Today, in the countryside, we still cook outside with wood or charcoal; in the city we use gas and electricity. The traditional kitchenware was once made with clay or bronze, now we use aluminum or cast iron, ceramic, Teflon or baking-glass ware. To cook rice we need a heavy pot to keep the rice warm. The electric rice cooker from Japan is a very practical one. To fry, we use a coolie hat pan, but I think that any pan can be used for this purpose, if it is wide enough to fry the whole chicken or the whole fish when needed, or deep enough for deep fat frying. Teflon sauce pans can help our sautéed and fried dishes a great deal. I really enjoy the new facilities in a modern kitchen and make good use of them.

Like you, I have little time and cannot spend the whole day in the kitchen. My way of cooking and serving is adapted to the Western way and it is quite different from the traditional one. In the United States, you can cook tasty Vietnamese food, even though you lack some spices, seasonings, and vegetables. However, you can use dry or powdered ones, provided that you know the similarity of fresh spices to powdered spices and essences.

Vietnamese people usually have three meals a day. In the cities, breakfast is lighter than lunch and dinner. In the country, many of us eat a heavier breakfast and dinner than lunch. Each regular meal has three courses: soup, a fried or sautéed dish or salad, and a salty dish. The last one is the main course, either meat, fish, chicken, duck, shrimp or crab... We prepare the main course a little salty because we have a hot climate and salt should be included in our food. Plain rice goes well with these plates.

Sticky rice is not served very often. For light breakfast we have soups like pho, mi, or some cakes. To entertain, we prepare more courses and most of us serve from four to eight dishes. A family dinner has three dishes at the same time, because each dish goes with rice. For guests we serve soup or salad first, rice last, we may have two to three soups for an evening party.

Vietnamese people cook more pork than beef. Fish, shrimp, crab, and fowl are used regularly. Nuoc mam (fish sauce) cannot be omitted for us. It is a very strong and salty sauce from fish. You may not like to smell it, but is is tasty when you know how to use it as a seasoning sauce, and how to prepare it for the table. Onion, coriander, garlic, hot red pepper, black or white pepper are the most important spices. We use a large number of fresh vegetable and seasoning leaves. Some of them cannot be found in the States.

For drinks, we have sticky rice wine which is very similar to Japanese Sake. The Vietnamese "moonshine" is a very strong and tasty sticky rice wine which is used widely in the countryside. We also have beer, soy bean wine, banana wine, rum, and soft drinks, but in the cities most of us serve guests imported wind or liquors. Each house has a tea pot ready to serve black tea at anytime, and after each meal. Some of us have coffee with breakfast or after dinner, always with sugar and milk or cream.

For dessert, we have candies, cookies, cakes, or sweet soup which may be prepared in advance. We can also use fruits for dessert, because we have a lot of them and they are very good: banana, water melon, mango Steen, durian, mango, guava, orange, grape fruit, pineapple.
To serve at the table, you can use plate, spoon, knife and fork, but usually you provide the guests with chopsticks to take the food. You can make a simple menu from the following recipes and choose your favorite dessert. Soup can go with a sautéed or fried dish or with one meat course, or you can have meat with one sautéed or fried dish, or salad can be served with one meat course, sautéed, or steamed.

For example:
MENU TYPE 1
Rice noodle and beef soup
Steamed stuffed cabbage
Peanut cookies
MENU TYPE 2
Cream of crab and asparagus soup
Charcoal grilled pork on skewers with noodles
Cassava cake
MENU TYPE 3
Chicken salad
Beef with onion, bell pepper and celery
Vietnamese flan
MENU TYPE 4
Vietnamese rolls (cha gio)
Chicken with spices in marinade
Banana cake

Vietnamese always like their own traditional food. Many of us cannot tolerate Western food longer than a week. In foreign countries, we cook for ourselves whenever it is possible and whenever we can find needed ingredients and spices.
The ingredients and spices used in the Vietnamese food are available in the US and also in many other parts of the Western World. They are usually displayed at the Chinese and Korean grocery stores or Oriental food shops whose addresses can be found in the telephone directory. When you have the addresses, drop in there to get the necessary items to cook, such as fish sauce, soy sauce, bean sprouts, green beans, coriander, etc.
The following are descriptions of some of the ingredients and spices listed in various recipes.
FISH SAUCE (nuoc mam)
Can be used plain to season fish, meat, shrimp before cooking or in soup or sautéed vegetables before serving. Since fish sauce is too salty to serve with grilled, fried, and sautéed dishes, we usually prepare it with lemon juice, sugar and chopped hot pepper. Vinegar can be substituted for lemon juice but the fish sauce will be less tasty.

SOY SAUCE
Although many people think that soy sauce is used only for Chinese and Japanese cooking, Vietnamese use it also for seasoning because of its distinctive flavor. In the recipes, soy sauce can be either the Japanese Shoyu or the Chinese Chiang Yu. American soy sauces are very salty and much more concentrated than the Oriental brands and less should be used.
SOY PASTE
Sweet or hot soy pastes are available in cans.

FAT
Vietnamese use pork fat more frequently than oil for sautéed and fried dishes. The taste is not much different, so that cooking oil may be substituted. For sautéed dishes the pan should be heated first, then oil added and immediately add the food to be sautéed.
MUNG BEANS (SMALL GREEN BEANS)
Dried ground mung beans are used for cooking. the hulls must be removed. When soaked in hot water the beans will expand and the hulls will fall off. To remove the last ones we rub the beans and rinse many times.
BEAN SPROUTS
Although canned bean sprouts may be purchased easily, the fresh ones should be used whenever available.
BAMBOO SHOOTS
Bamboo shoots are available in cans. Remove from can, scrape out the white calcium deposit sometimes found in the center of the shoots, and rinse in cold water.
GINGER ROOT
Use fresh ginger root whenever possible. Ginger root can be grown in your garden or in a flower pot. Plant it and dig up a small piece when needed. Wash and peel before using. One tablespoon of chopped ginger equals 1/8 teaspoon ginger powder
WATER CHESTNUTS
Water chestnuts are available in cans.
CITRONELLA (LEMON GRASS)
Citronella is widely used in Vietnamese food for seasoning of meat, fowl, port, beef and game. Fresh citronella cannot be found in America, but in Chinese grocery stores the dried product can be purchased. Citronella essence, available in drugstores, can be substituted. One drop of essence is equivalent to 1 teaspoon freshly chopped citronella.

CORIANDER
Coriander herb and seeds are both used as seasonings. Ancient Egyptian, Hebrew, Indians, Africans, Europeans used the seeds. Orientals, Americans, Portuguese, Syrians, prefer the herbs to seeds.
As an herb, coriander is familiar to many North Americans. It grows easily from new needs planted in a warm climate. The leaves are highly aromatic. Coriander can be found in Chinese or Mexican markets under the name of Chinese parsley of cilantro. We use the fresh leaves, whole or chopped to season soups and sautéed dishes. It is used not only for its distinctive flavor, but it can be probide a bright green garnish.
MONOSODIUM GLUTAMATE
Monosodium glutamate is a new seasoning in Vietnamese cooking. Restaurants use more of it than home cooking. Commercially, MSG is available as Aji-no-moto (Japanese), Accent and Mei Yen.
KITCHEN WARE
Vietnamese cooking does not need any particular pots or pans, and your own cookware may be used. A multipurpose pan, utilized by every Vietnamese family, is a coolie hat pan. We use it both for deep fat frying and general cooking, but any other pan can be substituted. Some people particularly like to use the Teflon sauce pan instead of our traditional coolie hat pan because it cleans easily and food cannot stick to it..


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[ soup ] [ salad ] [ grilled or baked ] [ sauteed and fried ] [ rice ] [ dessert ]