Viet World Kitchen

Hung on Top Chef

For a round up of how brother Hung did on Top Chef this week, take a read of:

• Jane McGivney's posting on the Huffington Post
• Baltimore Sun's take on the competition that took place in Aspen
• What Entertainment Weekly had to say about Hung's bitchery ways
• The scores he's getting on Blogging Top Chef
• Bravo's official Top Chef site . . . decide to Top or Chop Hung

They're stringing us along. That's good TV.

Baking with Charcoal and Sand

When I bought a new stove four years ago, I went to Sears where two out of three Americans buy their home appliances. I wanted a reliable, simple stove and selected a General Electric gas-powered one for $550. I couldn't afford stainless steel but went for cast iron grates, a large oven, and one 13,000 BTU burner.  Aside from that, it was a pretty 'average' range. Over the years, it continues to  work like a champ and is my buddy for recipe developing and testing. I couldn't imagine living/cooking without it.

The other day, however, I was reminded that there are people all over the world who use rudimentary -- but rather brilliant -- methods to make a good meal.  Geremi Nguyen emailed this question:

I have a baking question for you, my grandmother used to bake almond cookies (banh hanh nhan) over charcoals with some sprinkle of sand and the cookies were delicious.  Have you ever heard of this technique I think I may have left some description out because it was so long ago? I know that back then my grandmother always baked without an oven because there was no oven in the house.  Also most of our foods are cooked either by stove top,  grilling, frying and steaming so there was no need for an oven unless you own a bakery.  So could you please find out the answer for me and post it online or send it to me.

I can't imagine putting sand on cookies to make them taste good, though good almond cookies have a touch of salt in them and a bit of graininess to lend an edge. But that's really not what Geremi was inquiring about. He's talking about a simple method that Vietnamese cooks used (and some perhaps still do) to control cooking temperatures. While I'm no molecular gastronomist, cooking food is about applying heat. Good cooking is about controlling heat well.

In 1966,  my mother's oven was a 2-ply aluminum box that she placed on a charcoal brazier and put additional hot coals on the top of the box. The heat circulated between the layers of metal and she could bake in the box.  That was considered fancy and upscale.

Mom recently told me about judging a baking contest in a rural area outside of Saigon.  It was 1958 and she was young, somewhat intimated by the task at hand. "There were all these old women who turned out to compete," she said. "Though they were country people, they were highly skilled and surprisingly sophisticated in their techniques."   

These gals all had to bake cakes in molds that were shaped like those for popovers (see to the right for western popover molds). There were no ovens. Just charcoal braziers. What each woman did was place a metal skillet atop the hot charcoal. They put sand in the skillet to moderate the heat. The cake pans were placed inside the skillet with the batter in the mold. Duck eggs were used in the batter for extra richness.

With a lid covering the skillet, the cakes baked, rising to great heights and flowering open on top. Each entrant was judged on a number of qualities, one of which was how nicely they manipulated the baking so that the pattern on the cake's top was beautiful. "They must have had to cut the top partway through the cooking," Mom surmised. "I never learned their secret. But sand was a tool they used to bake amazing cakes."

"We used to roast peanuts, with their shells still on, in a skillet with sand in it so the peanuts would cook evenly," she added. "Back in those days you were busy controlling the heat somehow because the charcoal got so hot." One method was to burn your charcoal, whether it was hardwood or compressed pieces of coal, and then sprinkling on sand to the reduce the heat. When the coals were too cool, you'd poke at some of the sand to make it fall into the crevices between the chunks of charcoal. The addition of oxygen would revive the coals; I'm sure there was a bit of fanning too. The modern equivalent to adjusting the sand is to futz with the flame knobs on the stove.

My guess is that Geremi's grandmother used the sprinkle sand-on-the-charcoal method to control her heat. Almond cookies need moderate heat (350F) so she had to finesse that well to turn out good tasting cookies. Perhaps there was a special smokiness to the cookies, which may have been prepared with lard, not butter. Next time you're camping at the beach, this may be something to try.

Note: In Vietnam, like in other developing countries, people may also cook with rice straw and coconut husks, as well as other biomass fuels. It's

 

Harvest Time: Moon Cakes, Big Ag, Chili Sauces

Today is the Autumnal Equinox so I guess we're all officially packing up summer and readying for the cooler months. Soon, it'll be harvest time all over the globe. Here in Northern California, we have harvest festivals going on all over the place.

For Vietnamese people, we celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival, a holiday that's akin to American Thanksgiving. Like Lunar New Year, there's a brief pause for food, fun, and family. Moon cakes figure in this holiday -- which lands on September 25 so mark your calendar. Tet Trung Thu, as Tuesday's holiday is called in Vietnamese, is second to Tet. At the minimum, take a gander at the moon, share some love, and count your blessings.

Big Ag in Salinas, CA

I sure did recently when I took an agricultural tour of the Salinas Valley, which is nicknamed "America's Salad Bowl" because that's where most of the lettuce is grown for the entire United States. The temperate climate (cool mornings and evenings) keeps the leafy greens happy.

For the tour, I boarded a bus along with two dozen other people and we spent the day visiting farms and wineries. A highpoint was going out into the iceberg lettuce fields to get an up-close look at how it's harvested.

This is backbreaking labor. The workers, mostly from Mexico, do the harvesting and packing all day long so that people across the nation can get their fill of produce. The repetitive motion of cutting, trimming and packing the lettuce is no walk in the park. The women covered their faces and bodies well to prevent getting too tanned. I imagine the covering helps prevent exposure to other things too. I've always had much respect for these people as I drove by them at 75 mph on the highway but now, I'm even more in awe.

Where I live, we get most of our produce from local farmers and are blessed by their bounty. Many other people receive their lettuce, broccoli, and the likes from places very far away because they don't live close enough to super fresh food. I'm a champion of locally-grown produce but learning about the work and technology that goes into provide fresh, safe food was an eye opener. The Salinas Valley was hit with the E. coli spinach recount a year ago, so everyone we spoke to had bent over backwards to ensure consumers that what they grow is safely processed.

I still think that you're best off eating food that's traveled the least number of miles to your door. But if that's not possible, or if you really do need those strawberries in January(!), then know that there are people who are doing their darndest to safeguard the food supply.

Homemade Chili Sauces

As we transition into fall, the fresh chile supply will soon be gone. If you have a big harvest from your garden or can reap the benefits of someone else's harvest at a farmer's market or grocery store, then consider making your own chili sauce.

Josh Levine started a conversation when he asked me about preservatives in the Rooster brand chili sauces. What resulted from that posting was quite enlightening, including a couple of Viet-Americans -- Lili and Chuck -- who sent in their families' recipes for chili sauce. Check out the posting and comment thread and give it a whirl.

Pho in Lexicon

Yep, it was made official last week. Pho entered the dictionary. Say it loud and proud. It's hard to misspell too!

October Events

I'll be finishing the year with a few cooking classes and events next month. At the beginning and end of October are: 

Sunday, October 7: Slow Food Aquaterra Convivium
Join me to geek out on how rice is used in the Vietnamese kitchen at the "Transformations of Rice" Slow Food event in Emeryville, CA.  Guests will be eating, cooking, drinking and lots of conviviality.

Monday, October 29: Asia Society and Museum
Looks like we've made it! The Asia Society in New York City will be hosting a fabulous panel, discussion and tasting called "From Saigon to Soho: The Rise of Vietnamese Cuisine."

Beyond October, I'll just be in my hut, researching and writing. I'll keep and so should you!

Moon Cake Madness

A full moon means different things for different people. In the West, there are some who link full moons to spikes in crime, suicide, mental illness, disasters, accidents, birthrates, fertility and werewolves. Vietnamese, like their Chinese brethren, look forward to next Tuesday's gigantic full moon -- the biggest and brightest of the year -- as a marker of Mid-Autumn Festival, one of the most important holidays of the year.

Instead of crime sprees, we go on shopping sprees. (Yes, we do love and know how to shop!) At Vietnamese and Chinese markets and bakeries, people are  on mad hunts for a number of holiday 'must haves,' one of which are moon cakes that are sold in boxed sets of four. At first look, the little beauties resemble ceramic objects. However, cut into one and you'll see that the very thin, embossed dough encases a filling that varies from smooth lotus seed to red bean paste, green tea, to my favorite -- a mixed nut, sweetmeat and meat filling. Regardless of filling, in the center there's a yellow-orange egg yolk (duck or chicken egg) that serves as a fitting reminder of the moon. You may think this gross, but combining the sweet and savory lends extra complexity to foods and is a marker of many Asian sweets.

Though the Mid-Autumn Festival (called Tet Trung Thu in Vietnamese) has been celebrated for a thousands of years in China, the practice of gifting and eating moon cakes during this holiday supposedly date back to the Yuan Dynasty (1280 AD - 1368 AD), when secret notes stuck into moon cakes were sent around to get the Han Chinese to rise up against the Mongols who controlled their country at that time.  (More on the legend . . . ) The Vietnamese fought off Mongolian invaders twice so it's no surprise that moon cakes are appreciated in Vietnam too. Of course, a millennium of Chinese domination impacted Vietnamese culture quite a bit.

Making Moon Cakes

Most people buy their moon cakes (called banh Trung Thu or banh nuong in Vietnamese) but yours truly learned to make them at home. Asian shoppers may be crazily selecting moon cakes but my over-achieving mother would go into a frenzy making her annual mega batch of 6 dozen (72!) cakes. My father was her collaborator and was skilled at cutting up the lime leaf into tiny hair-like strands.

I used to get moon cakes from Mom but she 'hung up her gloves' three years ago and handed her well-worn wooden molds over to me. Since then, making moon cakes has become one of my annual culinary rituals.  Every summer since then, I’ve looked at my calendar and checked online to see when Tet Trung Thu is. Then I work backwards to prepare the moon cakes. First and foremost is salting the eggs, which take a good month. From there on in, it’s a matter of getting organized, assembling and prepping the ingredients, and getting ready for the actual day of making moon cakes. It's a lengthy commitment but well worth the effort.

Whether or not you make your own or buy moon cakes at the store, appreciate the process it takes to produce these ancient treats. The most thrilling and scary part of making the cakes is whacking them in the wooden molds. It’s a precise order and there’s no pussy footing. The whacking is done with gentle confidence,  lest the cake pop out of the mold entirely. Catching the cake at the end is always satisfying. 

If you're wondering, no I don't make six dozen each time. A dozen is good enough for me.

Buying and Eating Moon Cakes

When a moon cake is good, it’s wonderfully chewy with a delicate filling that's aromatic and flavorful, a perfect compliment to hot, fragrant tea like jasmine. When a moon cake is bad, aack (!), it's heavy and leaden, and weighs you down after just a few morsels. I suppose it's like a poorly crafted American fruitcake that gets offered to guests who politely demure.

So avoid ones that look heavy, oily or worse, are leaking oil. Ask when they were made to ensure freshness. Also pay mid to high-level prices to get good ones.

Moon cakes are not meant to be chomped on. Each one is shared because it is considered a precious and special once-a-year treat.  People enjoy them as small cut wedges with hot tea. The idea is that you nibble, sip and admire the moon. One cake offers four generous servings or 6 to 8 moderate servings. Use a sharp knife and the scalloped edges as your cutting guide.

If tea isn't your thing, here's my tip: Enjoy moon cake with sips of Mei Kwei Lu Chiu -- rose-petal sorghum liquor. It's sold at Chinese markets.

Pho in Oxford Dictionary

Cuong Le, an Australia-based friend who curated  "I love Pho" -- a wonderful, multimedia exhibit on pho noodle soup that's touring globally, tracks practically every related to Vietnam's national dish. He just emailed that pho has been officially added to the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary (SOED). The SOED is just a scaled down, two-volume version of the Oxford Dictionary.

Rachel Ray got EVOO in there a little while back so why not pho? I usually have to put pho in italics but now that it's officially part of the lexicon, I don't have to any more. Yippee!

Now, I'd love to get the word Viet in there . . . 

For more words that were added, read the Associated Press article by Kate Schuman

Mid-Autumn Festival -- Sept. 25

One week from today, on Tuesday, September 25, remember the moon. For the upcoming holiday, called Tet Trung Thu in Vietnamese (Mid-Autumn Festival or Moon Festival in English) the moon will be at its biggest and brightest this year.

That night, you may be inspired to croon like Dean Martin, “When the moon hits the sky like a big pizza pie, that’s amore.” For many Vietnamese people, that glorious moon won’t signal a cheesy pizza, but rather a moon cake – an ancient sweet of Chinese origin that goes back to the Yuan Dynasty (1280 AD-1368 AD). We savor tiny wedges of moon cake with fragrant tea as we gaze at the moon, thinking of family, friends, and the blessings we’ve had throughout the year. The roundness of the moon also embodies unity, harmony and family so this is a holiday of reflection.

The annual celebration occurs on the 15^th day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar (usually in mid to late September every year). It began during the Xia and Shang Dynasties (2000 BCE-1066 BCE) in China as an agricultural harvest holiday. Vietam, heavily influenced by Chinese culture (they were there for a good 1,000 years), celebrates the Mid-Autumn Festival too. Among all the Viet celebrations, Tet Trung Thu (pronounced “teht troong too”) is second to Tet Nguyen Dan (Lunar New Year) in terms of importance.   

Children, Lanterns and Legends

As a harvest festival, the holiday typically occurs after the field work has been done and all that’s left to do is harvest the rice. It’s a moment of rest for hardworking farmers and peasants, who take  pause to lavish attention on their children. In the past, during the growing season, adults were intensely laboring in the fields and their children were left to fend for themselves. At this time of the year, the focus turns to the kids and parents spend their respite having fun with their families and friends.   

Echoing the glow of the moon, tons of lanterns are present during the holiday. Children traditionally parade and dance on the streets all the while carrying colorfully lit lanterns. I have fond memories of stretching over the balcony railing of our home in Saigon to watch the lanterns pass by. They were made of cellophane glued on bamboo frames. Lit inside with a candle, they often caught on fire and we’d stare and laugh in shock and amazement at their fleeting beauty. It was a frequent holiday hazard that permanently put the smell of burning cellophane in my olfactory database.

Hoi An, a quaint tourist town in central Vietnam puts out huge displays of silk lanterns during this holiday. They're conveniently lit by electricity, which makes me miss the adventure of the old ones. (Note that in Malaysia and Singapore, this holiday is called the Lantern Festival.)

There are also many legends that are dragged out and retold. The Chinese have the story of Chang Er, a woman who took the immortal pill and became so lightweight that she floated to the moon. My favorite is a Vietnamese story about a man named Chu Cuoi who discovered a magic banyan tree whose leaves possessed healing powers. He uprooted the tree and planted it in his yard. When he tried to harvest leaves from the tree, the tree uprooted itself. As the banyan lifted off the ground, Chu Cuoi grabbed onto the roots and went upward with the tree, eventually landing on the moon. During the Mid-Autumn Festival, people try to make out the shadow of Chu Cuoi and the magic banyan tree.

In a different telling of the story, Chu Cuoi sought to protect the sanctity of the healing tree by forbidding anyone from urinating at the foot of the tree. His wife, Chi Hang, forgot his rule and did her business at the tree. It uprooted and she hung on for dear life, only to end up on the moon as her punishment for desecrating the magic tree.

Legends are never neat and tidy. Nevertheless, it’s good to note that across cultures, we’re all looking for that man or woman in the moon. Next Tuesday is a perfect opportunity to do so.

Related links:

For more on the children's focus of this holiday, check out these Youtube videos:

• Lantern dance (From Vietnam, note the popular star lanterns)
• Chu Cuoi story (From Vietnam, kitschy set)
• Little Saigon TV coverage of 2006 Tet Trung Thu show for kids

Other info:

• Detailed retelling of Chu Cuoi children's story (non-urination version
• Mid-Autumn Festival history and background (lots of Chinese information)
• Lantern popularity for 2005 Mid-Autumn Festival in Vietnam

Preservatives in Rooster Chili Sauces

Huy Fong's Rooster brand of chili sauces have become synonymous with Vietnamese food in America. In recipes, you'll see it listed as Vietnamese chili sauce or Sriracha chili sauce.  When you go to a pho restaurant, the Sriracha bottle is on the table.

Upon reading the latest Quick Bites ("We Don't Look and Cook the Same") newsletter, Josh Levine sent me this email:

I have been enjoying Rooster brand sauces but would prefer a version without sodium benzoate (the preservative). Have you heard of someone selling such a preservative-free product -- preferably Huy Fong?

While I pride myself in reproducing some of Vietnam's best dishes such as Pho and Green Papaya salad, I would prefer to buy rather than make the above-referenced sauce.

Any sources or ideas applicable to the NYC area? I checked the Hong Kong Market in South Plainfield (a huge place) with no luck.

Unfortunately, I don't know of any such products. Josh wrote partly out of having read an article from last Thursday's (9/6/07) New York Times. The piece recapped a study published in The Lancet, a British medical journal,  about the potentially harmful effects of food coloring and certain food additives, such as sodium benzoate. The study focused on children and the conclusion was this: "Common food additives and colorings can increase hyperactive behavior in a broad range of children . . . " The 'hyperactive behavior' is clinically termed attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), a problem that increasingly vexes us in the 21st century.

So if your child is super hyper and not willing/able to focus, you may want to cut down on foods containing food coloring and preservatives. Coloring is important in Asian cooking and in the Vietnamese kitchen, annatto is a natural colorant but cooks also like to use heavy doses of bottled food coloring. It' s not uncommon to see large (4 ounces or so) size bottles of food coloring at Viet grocery stores. Whenever I shop for Chinese egg noodles, I inspect the label and select ones without coloring.

Often times, especially if you consume lots of prepared and/or packaged foods, you simply can't avoid coloring and preservatives. That's not to say you're going to immediately suffer strange side effects. What's important to keep in mind is toxicity level -- how much of these additives are you putting into your body? Eat too much of something and there's bound to be a negative side effect.

For instance, my mother uses a light to moderate amount of MSG in her cooking but I've never (or yet) noticed any strange health effects. On the other hand, I've suffered headaches and a racing heart after loading up on cheap dim sum laden with MSG.

To answer Josh's question, I wouldn't worry much about the sodium benzoate in the chili sauce unless he was using tons of it every day over a long period of time. For me, not consuming tons of processed foods is the best strategy to keep those additives out of my system.

Is the Rooster even necessary?

Another thing about those chile sauces -- they're not required for good (authentic!) Vietnamese food. Just use fresh kickin' hot chiles -- either Thai, serranos, or whatever you can get your hands on. That's what you'd get at many restaurants in Vietnam and at my house. I keep Sriracha and the chili garlic sauce in my fridge but reach for certain dishes (see Ashley's comment and my response below; this edit reflects her correction of my position) or only if I'm feeling absolutely lazy and need a short cut to heat. 

A well crafted pho noodle soup broth would be killed by the addition of vinegary-hot Sriracha and sweet hoisin sauce. Add a slice or two of hot chile. (With the blandish jalapenos that restaurants in America offer, I add 3 or 4 slices.) For dipping sauces and dressings, the coarse chili garlic sauce is a fine addition for when you're in a pinch. But why not chop up (or pound with a mortar and pestle) chiles and garlic instead? The flavor will be fresh and free of food color and preservatives.

Whenever I'm at a Vietnamese restaurant in the States, I ask for fresh chile (ot hiem, pronounced "uht hee-em") and shun the prepared sauces because they make all the food taste the same. At home, I keep chiles frozen in zip top bag. They're stored in my freezer door where I can get to them in a flash!

Frozen chiles keep for at least 6 months. At farmers' markets right now, you should be able to score on lots of chiles. Or, purchase a bunch at an Asian market. Regardless, think long term and lay in a supply for the cool months ahead.

Related links worth wandering to:

• Josh has great photos of ethnic minorities in Vietnam at his site: joshlevine.org (click on Vietnam's Cloud people)
• Homemade Chili Garlic Sauce recipe (posted on 10/10/07)

We Don't Look and Cook the Same

Asia is on the rise and Vietnamese food is hip and hot. More and more Vietnamese crossover restaurants are opening up outside of traditional enclaves, introducing Vietnamese flavors to non-Viet people and creating 'modern' Vietnamese food. Huy Fong's Rooster brand of Vietnamese chili-garlic and Sriracha sauce are becoming ubiquitous. After all these years, I finally get to say that my people are popular!

Anything trendy is bound to be misrepresented. Popularity comes with its burdens as people capitalize on what Vietnam and Vietnamese means.

Indochine Interpretations

During the past couple of weeks, we've been having a spirited discussion on an episode of Sandra Lee's Semi-Homemade, a show that airs on the Food Network channel. In early August, they aired a show called "Indochine Brunch" that was quite a sight to see, with the show host sporting a pink kimono.

Mastery of any cuisine is not a birthright, but rather an acquisition. (As many of you know, you don't have to be Vietnamese to cook Vietnamese food!) Sandra Lee and her producers could have done more homework to understand what Indochine is. Instead, theirs was a mishmash of flavors and bad cooking techniques. Catch up and voice your opinion on the "Indochine Brunch".

A company that may be doing a better job at capitalizing on the Indochine exoticism is making Canton liqueur. Simon Bao emailed this morning about the re-released Canton -- made from French cognac, Vietnamese baby ginger, Provencal honey, and vanilla. Years ago, I tried the original version that was made in Guangdong province in China. It was terribly sweet but not bad tasting, though it was discontinued in 1997. The revived and new formula for Canton is looking to cash in on the cachet of being Vietnamese-French, or rather, Indochine. I haven't had a taste since the limited release late last month, but this description from their website captures their strategy: ". . . discover a rare union of tropical romance and continental sophistication."

Fast Food Vietnam

Vietnam may be one of the poorest countries in the world, but that doesn't stop fast food companies from storming in. There's a growing class of urbanites with money to spend. And so the number of clean, convenient, and mono-culture eateries is steadily increasing. McDonald's is coming soon. But should we be concerned? What do such businesses mean for Vietnam? Read and comment on fast food restaurants in Saigon.

But hey, corporations don't have to be the only ones making fast food. Home cooks can too. All you need is freezer space. If you want to make your own convenience food at home, make a batch or two of salmon cakes with dill and garlic and coconut waffles. Both can be made ahead and kept frozen for whenever the urge strikes you.

Top Chef

Speaking of TV, tune in this Wednesday night to watch the new episode of Top Chef, which airs on Bravo. Among the finalists in Season 3 is Hung Huynh, a Vietnamese-American sous chef in Las Vegas. Sara Nguyen, his fellow contestant, was eliminated earlier.

Asian Grandmas Cookbook Project

This isn't my next book.  It belongs to Pat Tanumihardja, a friend of mine who lives in Seattle. She just won the book contract and is looking for recipe contributions. It promises to be a great publication that honors the women who taught many of us how to cook, eat, and enjoy. Details  and contact information are in Pat's call for recipes.

By the way, a few weeks ago, we visited Seattle and Pat invited us to lunch at her mom's new Indonesian restaurant. We practically ran over there as soon as we arrived! Pat is pictured here with her mom at Julia's Indonesian Kitchen, a charming restaurant located in a small home in the Roosevelt neighborhood. I hope some of Julia's well-crafted Indo home cooking gets into Pat's book!

Upcoming Events

Cooking demonstrations, classes and panels will be taking me to various places in Southern California, the Bay Area, and New York. Hope to meet you on one of those occasions.