Vietnamese mango salad (gỏi xoài) is a vibrant dish featuring green mangoes, shrimp, and is highlighted with fresh herbs like mint, thai basil and cilantro. It’s a mouth-watering combination of sweet, sour, salty with lots of contrasts in texture. Disclaimer: this is supposed to be a very simple salad. The one we’re making here has a bit of extras to make it fancier.…
Chè chuối is a warm, Vietnamese pudding-like dessert featuring bananas and rich coconut cream. You can easily make this at home in less than an hour! Chè in Vietnamese, refers to sweet desserts which are liquid such as drinks, pudding, or even types of ‘soup.’ So chè chuối you could say is a type of pudding, made of coconut cream, tapioca pearls and bananas.…
What Is Bún Thang? My knowledge of the Vietnamese language is about on par with my grandma’s English, so this gives us lots of opportunities to learn from each other. She watches Viet news and Korean dramas which have a surprising amount of English in them. The latest term I explained to her was “poker face” hah! I asked her what bún thang means…
This is an easy 3-ingredient green papaya salad recipe (Gỏi Đu Đủ Khô Bò) you can throw together in a few minutes. There’s no cooking required, just easy prep so you can get to snacking. Green papaya and beef jerky salad is a light appetizer, a great choice for a snack or appetizer. My mom says she used to buy this from food carts…
Bánh xèo seems to be designed to be eaten as a family. The batter, filling ingredients, and veggies aren’t complicated to prepare, but they don’t make sense to be bought or made to be eaten by yourself. You don’t just buy 1/4 pound of pork, 8 shrimps, or buy 1/4 head of lettuce. You kind of have to bump the…
Bún bò Huế is a hidden Vietnamese gem that has yet to “make it” in mainstream American cuisine. It’s a rich and spicy soup with deep layers of flavor. This Central Vietnamese soup is paired with tender slices of beef and pork, then topped with lots of fresh herbs. I consulted my favorite Vietnamese cook–Mom–on how to make bún bò Huế. And to find out subleties that make BBH…
Making onion rings at home is SUPER easy. It’s much more fool-proof than when I made sweet potato fries (<–Even though I eventually found a way!). I’ve been munching on a lot of onion rings lately and I blame it entirely on my girlfriend. Well…I do take some blame too, but they really are delicious. A crunchy, warm onion ring fried to a deep golden brown.…
It has been getting coooold lately, cold for Southern California anyways! This is perfect weather for you to cook up some soup. If you haven’t built up the courage to try the bitter melon soup I posted the other week, Vietnamese chicken soup with elbow macaroni might be a simpler start :). What’s that you say? Elbow macaroni isn’t Vietnamese?…hmm.…
Spaghetti squash is something I’ve seen online and social media for YEARS that caught my interest. My girlfriend was actually craving spaghetti squash carbonara this week, so I finally gave in and wanted to see what the fuss was about. There are paleo and other ‘cleaner’ spaghetti squash recipes you could make instead, but if you want to indulge, this is…
There are LOTS of fresh veggies in many vietnamese dishes, wouldn’t you agree? Any time you have a wrap, or something being dipped into sauce, it’s almost a given fresh lettuce or herbs will be a part of it. And in how many other types of soups do you order and pretty much expect a side of bean sprouts or…