A few months ago, while Susan’s parents were visiting, we made Vietnamese spring rolls (aka salad rolls) for dinner. Her mom asked for the recipe and I thought that might be a good blogging topic, a reminder of summer on a drab rainy November day.
These are the soft rolls in rice paper, not the deep fried ones. So they’re extremely healthy, easy to make as long as you have some of the basic ingredients, and pretty adaptable to whatever you have at hand: it’s really not a fixed recipe at all. We grew up eating these often, which sounds odd for a Chinese family: but my mom was born and raised in Vietnam, so these come natural to her.
The Meat
Bì cuốn
Vietnamese salad rolls are usually distinguished by the meat that goes in them. Bì cuốn are the ones we ate more often: the meat that goes in them is bì, which is a mixture of shredded pork and pork skin. Yes, pork skin - if you’re squeamish about that, you might want to skip ahead. Pork skin is tasteless, and is there mainly for the texture: it’s a little bit like stretchy elastic noodles with a bit of bite to them. If you’re lucky enough to live close to a Chinatown or a Vietnamese grocery store, you can sometimes find premade bì - for example, I’ve seen this in several places in Oakland’s Chinatown, in plastic zip lock baggies right next to the cashier. If you can’t find premade, but you can find pork skin, here’s how to make your own:
- 8 oz pork skin
- I’m used to the pre-sliced frozen variety, which comes in a 8 oz bag, something like this. I think it also comes in a dried, nonfrozen form. Either way, follow the directions on the bag - the frozen stuff usually involves thawing, then rinsing in a few changes of water. If not presliced, cut into thin strips (1/8 inch wide, a few inches long). Pat dry.
- one pound shredded pork
- This can be pork loin, boiled and shredded into thin pieces. If you want to get fancy, you can slice the pork and saute it, or braise it in soy sauce or coconut milk or what have you. You want the end result to be pretty dry though, and the shreds to be fairly thin (no more than 1/8 inch).
- 4 tablespoons roasted rice powder
- Known as thình in Vietnamese. It has a very distinctive roasty taste. You can buy this at a good Vietnamese grocery store in little packets that cost less than a dollar (see upper left corner in picture below). Or you can make your own: in an dry skillet, toast rice kernels (short grain, glutinous rice preferably) until golden brown. Let cool, then grind to a powder with a coffee grinder or a mortar and pestle.
To make bì, simply toss above together until the rice powder coats everything. You’re done. This makes a lot, probably enough for two meals at least (unless you make really packed rolls and have big eaters). My experience is that bì doesn’t keep very long in the fridge, but it freezes fine.
Gỏi cuốn
Gỏi cuốn are rolls made with shrimp - preferably, the tiger prawn variety. Boiled, deveined, cut in half. Generally they go in a single layer, so count on about 2-3 shrimps (four to six halves) per roll.
Chicken
At less authentic fast food places - for example, the lunch counter in Uwajimaya in Seattle - you’ll quite often find a choice between chicken and shrimp rolls. Lightly poached chicken breasts (don’t overcook them), shredded, and then optionally tossed in roasted rice powder works quite well.
Grilled pork or beef
Less traditional, since I associate this more with vermicelli salad (bún). However, they have bánh hỏi on the menu at LeCheval in Oakland, which is basically salad rolls with skewered grilled pork or beef, and it works pretty well there. I don’t have a good recipe for Vietnamese style grilled skewered pork yet, but a charcoal grill seems to be essential.
The Rest
I’d say the wrappers, vermicelli, and Vietnamese mint/basil are mandatory. Everything else (including the meat) is optional and adjustable. Actually, the wrappers are optional too: go heavier on the vermicelli, add some scallions and crispy shallots fried in oil, and you have the makings of vermicelli salad (bún).
- spring roll wrappers
- Bánh tráng in Vietnamese (and labelled as such), you can find these in an Asian grocery in flat, square plastic bags or sometimes in harder round plastic shells to protect them. The ones I’m used to are just made from rice, water, and salt, and usually have a basket weave texture on them which comes from the bamboo mat on which they’re dried. (Some other ones use tapioca starch, apparently so you don’t need to use hot water to soften. I figure you should just use hot water and develop asbestos hands. The smaller package shown above has tapioca starch, the larger package is just rice.) Very thin and will crumble if bent while dry. There are two sizes for the circles: 5 inches and 8 inches (see above). They also come in quarter wedges. You want the circles, size up to you. There seems to be a lot of variability in the brands, with inferior brands being prone to tearing while you try to roll up the wrapper, or being very tough and impossible to soften - the better brands are balanced between the extremes. The brands that have a red rose or a three headed elephant on the packaging seem to be reliable. Or just buy what everyone else does at the grocery store. In our experience, spring roll wrappers actually do have a shelf life. If you let them sit around for more than a year or so, they seem to dry out even further and become unpredictable when you try to soften them.
- 8 oz rice vermicelli
- Quite often labelled as “rice stick”, which I find confusing. If you’re paying more than a dollar for a pound, you’re getting ripped off. Ingredients should be rice and water and nothing else. Prepare according to package directions (usually by boiling for 5 minutes or so, then drain). Don’t let the noodles sit around too long, otherwise they’ll clump into a gluey mess. Eight ounces is approximately good for eight rolls - this is variable depending on your meat, veggie, and noodle ratio in your rolls.
- Vietnamese mint and/or basil
- Fresh, please, and you just want the leaves. I’ve never been quite clear about the distinction between mint, basil, and the Italian versus Southeast Asian varieties. If you buy something labelled mint or basil in an Asian grocery store, chances are it’s the right stuff. It’s quite pungent, and if you’re not used to the punch you might want to try only a few leaves per roll. If you can’t find this, then I’d go with mint. The sweet basil you use in Italian cooking is useable, but it’s tending towards the wrong flavor.
- green leaf lettuce (not iceberg)
- You can cut or tear this into strips, or just leaf it. I prefer the latter, since my rolling technique involves using half of a leaf to help protect the wrapper.
- carrots
- Cut into match sticks. Optionally, pickle in nước chấm first (recipe follows).
- cucumber, cut into match sticks
- bean sprouts
- More optional than not. They add a nice crunch, but we find them hard to use in salad rolls, as they tend to punch through the wrapper.
- cilantro
- You can use the stalks and leaves.
- green onions
- Green parts should be cut into short (2 inch) pieces, the white parts should be cut into matchstick slivers.
- roasted peanuts, crushed
- Optional - LeCheval does this, and Susan likes it.
- plenty of very hot water
To proceed: put the hot water in a large bowl, one that will accomodate an entire wrapper. You’re going to dip each wrapper briefly in the water. Don’t believe any recipes that tell you to do this in cold water, or to blot the sheet with a wet towel or anything like that: we used the cold water for years and it is far inferior to the hot water immersion technique. You want to saturate the entire rice paper for no more than a few seconds. When you take it out it should still be pretty firm - put it on large plate and it will soften in about a minute.
Here’s where photos would help, but I’ll have to just describe for now. Put your filling in a row in the center half of the bottom quarter of your disc, keeping about an inch of wrapper free. I like to put down some flat leaf lettuce, then a bit of everything else on top of that - the lettuce helps to keep everything else from punching through the wrapper (particularly if you use cilantro stalks or bean sprouts). Roll firmly upwards once until you’ve just covered the filling with wrapper. If your filling has ripped a hole in the paper, don’t worry about it; you should have enough wrapper left over to cover the hole. Fold the left and right sides over the center; then keep rolling upwards. The paper should self stick and keep everything tight. If you’ve achieved the proper amount of filling, the result is about an inch in diameter and quite firmly packed. This takes a bit of practice; be prepared to ruin your first few - you can always wrap a ruined one in a second wrapper, or just dump the wrapper and eat the resulting salad in a bowl (pour nước chấm on top and you have bún).
If you’re making gỏi cuốn, some people like to highlight the shrimp by not pulling them in with the rest of the filling until after you roll once, i.e. the shrimp sort of goes on the second layer.
Anywhere from three to six rolls feeds one person. If you’re making a batch, you can pipeline the creation process: dip a wrapper, and while waiting for that to soften, roll another wrapper. The pipelining extends to multiple people. Or the LeCheval approach: each diner gets their own paper and rolls their own at the table.
Rolls are served with dipping sauces, which follow.
Nước Chấm
Bì cuốn, the pork skin rolls, are traditionally dipped in nước chấm, but the sauce is also served with a lot of other dishes in Vietnamese cuisine. The proportions here are courtesy of Mom, and are approximate - it depends on how sour the lemons are, how salty the fish sauce is, etc.
- approximately 1/2 cup fish sauce (nước mắm)
- Fish sauce, essential for Vietnamese cooking. There’s a difference between the Vietnamese and Thai varieties, as I discovered this summer: the Thai stuff is much stronger and saltier, the Vietnamese variety is less potent and sweeter. You want the latter. The (unfortunately) named “Cock” brand is what my Mom usually buys, we currently have a bottle of “Three Crabs Brand” which is apparently decent. Don’t ask how this stuff is made.
- juice from 2 limes or lemons
- Limes are traditional, Mom prefers lemons, I’m neutral.
- approximately 2/3 cup sugar
- White granulated is perfectly fine. Palm sugar might be more correct, but the color of the final result (light brown) comes from the fish sauce, not the sugar.
- 1 cup boiling water
- minced garlic to taste, optional
- The amount is up to you. We tend to use a LOT, 2 or 3 cloves or even more.
- minced chili pepper to taste, optional
- Jalapenos will work, or if you’re insane, birds eye chilis. If you don’t want to handle chili peppers, you can cheat and use one or more tablespoons of chili sauce, preferably the Sriracha variety.
- carrot and/or daikon radish, optional
- Cut into match sticks. You can either treat this as garnish or incorporate the carrot or radish into your spring rolls.
Add lime or lemon juice to the water. Slowly add sugar, letting it dissolve and tasting frequently until the balance of sweetness to sour is correct. Add fish sauce, again tasting frequently until the balance of saltiness to everything is to your taste. Mix in everything else. Let cool, serve warm or cold. This stuff will sit in the fridge for upwards of a week, although if you make it with garlic, the garlic sometimes turn funny colors in a few days. It doesn’t affect the flavor but it sure looks weird.
Nước Lèo
Dipping sauce for gỏi cuốn, shrimp rolls, but you can use this for other types of rolls if you’re not a fan of fish sauce. By the way, I’m not sure those are the correct diacritical marks in lèo. My mom never made this, and I’m sure this is far from the authentic recipe, but it tastes pretty darn close to what we got when we went to restaurants:
- minced garlic - 1 or 2 cloves
- 1 tablespoon oil
- minced chili pepper to taste, optional
- Again, you can cheat by substituting Sriracha.
- 1 tablespoon brown sugar
- half cup hoisin sauce
- Making your own just isn’t worth it.
- 2 tablespoons smooth peanut butter
- half cup roasted peanuts, ground
- I buy a jar of Planters, give it a whirl in the food processor. You could actually cheat even more and just substitute chunky peanut butter for both the smooth peanut butter and roasted peanuts.
- juice of one half lime (or more to taste)
- approximately half cup water or more, to thin out
Saute garlic in oil in small saucepan until golden. Add rest of ingredients and heat, while whisking until smooth. Use more or less water until it reaches desired consistency. Garnish if desired with more peanuts.That’s it - enjoy! The next time we make these I’ll update this entry with some photographs.
