Viet World Kitchen

Fish Sauce Taste Off

When I was in Singapore last month, food expert Christopher Tan (foodfella.com) and I had a long conversation about different kinds of fish sauces. I'd tasted it in a number of dishes in Singapore and was surprised to see it so present in the food. Yes, the beloved Viet condiment is used in many cuisines, and it's just not in that of Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines.  I mentioned that Knorr has been buying and bottling tons of nuoc mam fish sauce from Phu Quoc island off the coast of Vietnam -- where the best fish sauce is made. (Okay, I'm biased!) Chris, who has a well-tuned palate and amazing passion for food, said he was preparing for a fish sauce tasting in Singapore and would get some.

In preparation for the event, Chris asked me to decipher this fish sauce label from a Knorr bottle. The label basically touts it's purity and well-balanced flavors -- a lot like a fine wine. It also says to users that it's just for dipping sauces and table uses. It's too good to be cooked with. The price is rather low -- 12,000 Vietnamese Dong (75 cents), which is probably for one of the small tableside-sized bottles. Click on the thumbnail image to view a larger one.

So how did the Vietnamese fish sauce stand up the others? Chris just sent these remarks and  results:

China - Swee Huat Yu Lu from Shantou
Very salty, otherwise unremarkable. A bland fish sauce more suited to cooking or adjusting the seasoning of a sauce/gravy with, or for light dips.

The Philippines - Florence Patis
Salty flavour, though aroma has slight sweetness. Very simple taste. Very short aftertaste has a slight flatness from sodium benzoate.

Thailand - Tiparos nam pla
Both sweet and salty in the initial taste - it contains added sugar - but overall much better balanced than the above two sauces, with stronger and more rounded anchovy notes.

Vietnam - Thanh Ha Chanh Hieu Phu Quoc nuoc mam, 40 Dam
Easily the most complex of all the sauces we tasted. Beautiful colour. The salt hits you first, but then the fish flavours come forward. Rich and smooth feel in the mouth.

Vietnam - Knorr Nuoc Mam Cham
A lot of people liked this. Like a sweeter version of the Thanh Ha, and to me even oilier on the lips. Long aftertaste. Would be peerless as a dipping sauce base.

Myanmar - Fish Sauce (label's all in Burmese, but there's a prawn-shaped logo on it, so maybe prawn brand?)
Very interesting - earthy, mushroomy notes in its aroma, and a murky cola colour, but the taste, though salty, was quite mild, with some of the funky, leaf-mould nuances that you taste in some Burmese dishes. Would work well in braised dishes containing mushrooms, or in claypot rice, I'd wager.

Korea - Sandlance Fish Aekjeot (label is totally in Korean, so don't know the brand name)
Meant primarily for making kimchi, apparently. This had good colour and was very smooth, but it smelt sulphurous, like pungent salted-egg yolks, and hence was almost universally face-wrinkling.

I've done personal tastings myself but not for a crowd. Sounds like fun! If any of you are tasting new kinds of fish sauce, let us know!

What is Authentic Asian Food?

Binh and Robyn just brought up an important issue that plagues me -- keeps me worried and up at nights, frankly: What is authenticity in the realm of food?

For example, every once in a while, I get an email from a Vietnamese American asking me if my book, Into the Vietnamese Kitchen, offers authentic Vietnamese recipes or Americanized Vietnamese recipes. I don't know what "American Vietnamese" food is about. Are they wanting techniques and ingredients presented from the motherland? Am I inauthentic because I use a 4-burner gas stove instead of a single burner, propane fueled system or a charcoal brazier? Should I sit on a low stool on the floor to do all the prep work? What about the food processor -- one of my favorite appliances? Is that modern convenience inauthentic?

I know what is good and what is bad food to my palate. I wouldn't put forth a recipe that I wouldn't eat or wouldn't proudly present to family and friends.  As a food writer and recipe developer, I try to compromise as little as possible but I also balance that with the need to get people into the kitchen to cook.

In response to such queries, I often ask these folks to elaborate a bit, and one of the responses has been that Americanized Vietnamese food is the overly sweet crud that is dished up in Viet restaurants. Well, my friends, plenty of Vietnamese people prepare and patronize those establishments and they say that the food is cheap but "it's just okay." Why eat it then? Why not demand better? Why not make it yourself. You'll have no one else but yourself to praise or blame.

I'm a stickler for learning the foundations of cooking and of a cuisine before fiddling with it. I'm working on a new book project (not Vietnamese) and in a conversation with a renown Japanese food expert and author Elizabeth Andoh, she mentioned that she avoids the word classic because food is constantly changing.  She instead goes for 'typical' preparations -- what people in the main prepare, how they prepare it.  We didn't even touch on what authenticity is. However, at the end of the day, the food has to taste good and the techniques have to be solid.

Something else that Elizabeth said a few years back that always sticks with me is this (and I paraphrase): Mastering a cuisine is not a birthright. This means that just because you're of a certain ethnicity doesn't mean that you're genetically programed to prepare it well.

Saveur magazine, a food magazine that I write for and am a contributing editor of, has the tagline of "Savor a world of authentic cuisine." So what does that mean? How is authentic cuisine defined? We answer it all the time, for every story, and it changes because it has to do with the subject. At the end of the day, I always define authentic cuisine as one that captures the relationship between people and their food.

If any of you are philosophy types, Jean Paul Satre was a proponent of something called the authentic self -- meaning that you are a true, honest person. Though that authentic self includes the good, bad and ugly, I like to put a positive spin on things by defining authentic food as this: Good tasting food that's well-crafted from someone's heart and soul.

And now, it's your turn!

Some parting thoughts and I await your shots...

• What does authentic food mean to you?
• I just came back from Asia, where I did some serious eating with Robyn and her husband Dave in Kuala Lumpur, where the cuisine is a crazy combination of Asian cuisines that's evolved over centuries. How would you capture authenticity there?
• In Hong Kong, there is instant ramen noodles everywhere for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  Is that authentic  Hong Kong fare or merely a trend?
• In our post-modern, reality-TV based world of the Food Network and Top Chef, how authentic is the stuff presented on air?

Caramel Sauce

If you're going to delve deeply into cooking Vietnamese food, get over your fear of heat and make some caramel sauce! It's not as difficult as you may think. Just get some sugar, water and a saucepan. Once you've mastered it, it will quickly become your stealth ingredient. All you're doing is nearly burning sugar.

Caramel sauce (nuoc mau, pronounced "nook mao") is one of the cornerstones of Vietnamese cooking. It's primarily used in kho dishes to simmer savory foods such as whole fish, pork, shrimp, chicken, eggs and tofu -- homey foods that are the soul of Vietnamese cooking. The color and flavor of caramel sauce are transformative, making food not only look beautifully amber but also delectable! For an in-depth discussion of how to use nuoc mau in kho dishes, read "The Taste of Tet" posted on the Vietworldkitchen.com site; recipes are included.

The term nuoc mau was originally coined in South Vietnam. People in North Vietnam called the same ingredient nuoc hang ("nook hahng"), literally translated as 'merchandising water', probably because it was so often used by food hawkers to enhance the appearance of their wares. Think of how molasses add to the flavor of barbecued foods.

The traditional method of making this sauce requires you to add boiling water to the caramelized sugar, which starts a dramatic reaction that's not for the faint of heart. The point of doing this is to arrest the cooking process so that the sugar doesn't burn to a bitter black stage. I find it easier to place the pan bottom into a sink filled with water and then adding the remaining water to dilute the sugar. The result of both approaches is the same bittersweet inky sauce that's a staple in every Vietnamese kitchen.

Use caramel sauce for Viet kho dishes, or as a little cheat in your marinades for foods that will go on the grill so that they color nicely. Don't put it on ice cream or other desserts. Its sweet, dark coffee flavor will taste yucky bad. Finally, select a light-colored saucepan to monitor the caramelization, and make sure it's clean.

Resist buying the heinous tasting pre-fab caramel sauce at the Vietnamese market that's labeled "coconut thin sauce".  You're better off doing it yourself! The photos below are for encouragement.

Makes 1 cup.

1 cup sugar
¼ cup plus ½ cup water

Fill the sink with enough water to come halfway up the side of a 1-quart, heavy-bottomed saucepan. Place the sugar and 1/4 cup of the water into the saucepan and cook over medium-low heat. Stir until the sugar dissolves, about 2 to 3 minutes.

As the sugar melts, the mixture will go from opaque to clear. Small bubbles will form at the edge and gradually grow larger, moving toward the center of the pan. Eventually, bubbles will cover the entire surface. After about 15 minutes, the sugar will begin to caramelize and turn in color. You'll see a progression from cham pagne yellow to light tea to dark tea.

When smoke starts rising, remove the saucepan from the heat and slowly swirl it around. Watch the sugar closely as it will turn darker by the second; a reddish cast will set in (think the color of a big and bold red wine) as the bubbles become a lovely burnt orange. Pay attention to the color of the caramel underneath the bubbles. When the caramel color is that of black coffee or molasses, place the pan in the sink to stop the cooking process. The hot pan bottom will sizzle upon contact and the bubble action will subside.

Add the remaining 1/2 cup of water (there may be a small dramatic reaction) and place t he saucepan back on the stove over medium heat, stirring until the caramel has dissolved into the water. The result will be slightly viscous; flavor-wise, it will be bittersweet. Pour the caramel sauce into a small glass jar and let it cool; it will thicken further. Store indefinitely in your kitchen cupboard.


Recipe from Into the Vietnamese Kitchen: Treasured Foodways, Modern Flavors (Ten Speed Press, 2006).

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.

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)

How to Find Asian Markets & Ingredients

You're ready to cook Vietnamese food but where are the ingredients? They're not particularly hard to find, especially because Asian cooking is increasingly popular and there are Asian communities all over. Once you've found the foodstuffs, the equipment is usually in the market too or at a nearby shop.

If you're new to Asian markets, you'll have to stretch a bit. While many of the ingredients may be locally available, Viet cuisine has yet to become mainstreamed. Certain staples, such as high-quality fish sauce and rice noodles, will require a trip to a Chinese or Southeast Asian market.

Cooking is a fun social and human activity. Part of the experience is shopping for ingredients, which may entail going to unfamiliar neighborhoods and bridging language and cultural barriers. If you smile, are polite, and show interest, people will gladly help. During the last thirty plus years, Vietnamese people have splendidly preserved and developed their culinary traditions far away from their ancestral home. There's no reason why you can't do it too. The payoff is delicious.

Rather than present a list of stores that's bound to change and be incomplete, this posting contains tips to help you find ingredients and equipment.

Strategies for Your Search

Find a Viet enclave nearby and check the local yellow-pages for "Grocers and Markets." According to the 2000 U.S. Census, Vietnamese Americans are the fourth largest Asian ethnic group in America. We are surprisingly in many places. While the biggest Vietnamese-American communities are in California, Texas, and Washington, D.C., there are folks in Atlanta, Boston, New Orleans, New York City, and Seattle too. Even Wichita, Kansas, and Grand Rapids, Michigan, have burgeoning populations. Do an internet search for "Vietnamese community in X city or X state" and see what you find.

Don't limit yourself to Vietnamese markets. Chinese, Thai, Cambodian, Laotian, and Filipino markets also sell ingredients for Vietnamese cooking. The herbs may not be available, but other essentials like fish sauce will be on the shelves. Use cultural and historic intersections as starting points. Where there's a substantial community of Asian people, there are markets that cater to their cooking needs. Chinese-owned Ranch 99 Market is a great pan-Asian chain of grocery stores with locations in California, Washington, Arizona, Hawaii, and Nevada. Mainly on the East Coast and with a super location in Niles, Illinois, H Mart (select English in upper right-hand corner) is a Korean-owned chain of great Asian markets.  Other notable chains include Hong Kong Supermarket and Shun Fat Supermarket.

Pretty reliable online listings of Asian markets in America can be found at:

• Thaifoodandtravel.com: Straight listing with some commentary by Thai cookbook author and cooking teacher Kasma Loha-unchit
• New Asian Cuisine: Interactive US map from Savory productions, an Asian-food marketing company
• ThaiTable.com: Enter a zip code to search
• Merry's Kitchen of Indonesian Cuisine: Simple but robust listing from a food-loving, Jakarta-based florist

Explore Chinatowns. Chinese influences in Vietnamese cooking run deep, and many of the ingredients are the same. A fair number of the grocery stores are owned and run by Chinese-Vietnamese Americans. Chinatown houseware and restaurant supply shops stock steamers, dishware, and other nifty cooking tools.

Ask Viet people who are "in the know." For example:

• The folks who run your favorite Vietnamese restaurant. Where do they buy their ingredients?
• Your Vietnamese manicurist. Where does she or he shop for food and specialty equipment?
• Members of a local university's Vietnamese Student Association. An international organization with numerous chapters in the U.S., VSA sponsors cultural events and food festivals. These students know their community's culinary resources. Check the university website.

Go beyond Asian markets. Peruse non-Asian markets (such as Latino, Middle Eastern, and Caribbean), health food stores, and the international or Asian food section of mainstream supermarkets. You'll be amazed to discover what's stocked on the shelves. Good Mexican butcher counters and carniceria meat markets are treasures.

Shop farmers' markets. In a number of places in the country, Hmong and Vietnamese farmers are trucking loads of fresh Asian produce to weekly markets. Non-Southeast Asian farmers are increasingly growing Asian vegetables and herbs. Check websites such as localharvest.org for local markets and farms.

Use culinary message boards. The virtual community of cooks that can be found at sites like eGullet and chowhound is full of insights.

Only as a last resort should you purchase Asian ingredients and equipment online or through mail order. Because inventories and service fluctuate, check around to see what's currently available and reliable. Among the online and mail order sources worth exploring are:

The Oriental Pantry (Acton, MA)
(978) 264-4576, orientalpantry.com
Offers a broad selection of Asian ingredients. Fish sauce is in "Misc. Other Foods."

Pacific Rim Gourmet (Escondido, CA)
customerservice@pacificrim-gourmet.com, pacificrimgourmet.com
Inventory is organized according to cuisines.

The Wok Shop (San Francisco, CA)
(415) 989-3797, wokshop.com
No food sold here, but the selection of cooking equipment is excellent, including wood moon cakes, which are listed in "Hard to Find Items."

Finely Shredding Ingredients

When a recipe calls for finely shredding an ingredient (usually a carrot for a salad or garnish or ginger), it doesn't require a four-sided box grater. Neither is it asking you to perfectly julienne.

All you have to do is cut the item on the diagonal into thin slices, a scant 1/8 inch thick. Note that when cutting the diagonal slices, the angle of your knife determines the overall length of the shreds. Then assemble the slices into several short stacks-flat side against the cutting board for stability, and use the "curled knuckles" approach to cut at 1/16 to 1/8-inch intervals for fine shreds.

The shreds will not be uniform in length, but that is fine because there's a lot of beauty in not having things always perfect. Finely shredded ingredients lend sparks of color to a dish. To have them all the same size would be awfully boring.

I recently purchase a couple of seemingly handy tools at my favorite Asian housewares shop. They were specifically made for shredding carrot and other rooty vegetables. I loved their plastic coloring and they were cheap -- 98 cents to $1.99. Here's how they fared against a knife:

The handled dragging tool make in Thailand was suppose to be great for carrots and green papaya but there were constantly times when the shreds didn't separate cleanly. Despite the convenience, it's a little awkward to firmly drag the shredded across the hard surface of a carrot. I've used similar expensive shredders made in Japan (those are about $10 and have very sharp, pointy toothed blades) and experienced the same awkwardness.

The pink one, which was textured to resemble wood, had holes that were too small. I got fine, wispy shreds more like the ones on American box graters. The interesting thing about the pink gadget was that the metallic blade was humped (curved), making the shredding process easier than a completely flat surface.

I think I'll stick with my cheap, multi-purpose Japanese vegetable knife for doing the fine shred.

Growing Rice Paddy Herb (Ngo Om)

Having to replenish my Vietnamese herb garden after the gopher attack a couple weeks ago, I visited my favorite Vietnamese market in San Jose, California, Thien Thanh (located on the corner of Keyes and Story Road). There's always a bunch of starters on sale at the door of market this time of year. A friendly store employee or two stays outside to keep an eye on customers and things happening in the tiny parking lot.

It was blazing hot and the shady overhang of the market entrance was a welcome respite from the heat, particularly when I see lush quart-size pots of tía tô (red perilla), kinh giới (Vietnamese balm), húng (mint), rau răm  (Vietnamese coriander), and various kinds of ớt (chiles). A man and woman surrounded me and honed in on making a sale. I was looking for just a pot of kinh giới and a chile plant but walked away with unexpectedly more.

Every year for the past 5 years, I've tried growing ngò om (Limnophila aromatica) and was unsuccessful at getting the sweet tender stems of the citrusy, cumin-y herb to flourish. It never grew much and would just poop out, no matter how much watering and feeding I did. This year, I vowed not to get one. Using dried cumin, just like my mom taught me, was good enough for finishing my canh chua cá (Vietnamese sour fish soup with tamarind, pineapple, and okra). Many southern Viet cooks who love this herb also finish curries with it.

 As I was checking out the herb selection, I noticed several pots covered in sweaty plastic. The man and woman informed me that it was ngò om. “Huh? What was it doing in plastic?,” I asked.

“That’s a great way to grow it,” he said, coyly smiling. The pot was full of mature rice paddy herb, and he advised me to take it home and put it in a larger pot so it would have room to grow. “Then, find a large plastic bag and put the entire plant in it. Poke a few holes to let air in, and the tie the bag up. You don’t have to water the plant.”

“No water at all?” I asked to double check. We’re being asked to conserve water this year in northern California so I was extra interested. Plus, I’m kind of lazy about watering. 

“No water,” he said, and the sale was made.

The clever method was essentially like making a tiny greenhouse for each pot. As the name suggests, rice paddy herb requires a lot of moisture and heat. In Vietnam’s humidity, particular in the southern region, this herb flourishes.

At home, I opened up the bag and followed his instructions to actually create 3 separate pots of plants to maximize my harvest. The stems fell apart easily for separation and I recycled the pots from the other plants I’d bought for these, filling them up with fresh potting soil. (These pots are the typical quart-size ones you’d find at nurseries. Use bigger pots and you’ll have to find extra large plastic bags!) The clusters of rice paddy herb went in and I gently patted the soil down to make sure they were securely in place.

It was a hot afternoon and I should have done this project in the shade, for after sitting in open air under the sun for just about 15 minutes, the delicate stems wilted. Bent over and looking glum, they didn’t look perky whatsoever. Great. My annual rice paddy herb disaster was manifesting in a new guise.   

Plants, as I’ve found, are pretty resilient so I persevered and put them in their makeshift green house. I used different kinds of plastic bags to see what would happen --  clear plastic produce bags as well as the handled kind you get at checkout. I avoid bags that were completely opaque and those with too much colored lettering. My rationale was based on the large greenhouses I’ve seen on farms. They’re covered with translucent plastic.

Closing the top with rubber bands found in the kitchen, I set the pots aside in full sun. In about 30 minutes, they were all standing upright again. Shazam. Amazing.

Over the course of the next few days, I realized the leaves were getting a bit brown so I moved them into a partial shaded part of the patio. Thus far, they’re growing taller and are alive. As for watering? I haven’t added a single drop.

 

Growing Vietnamese Herbs

Every spring I plant a number of Vietnamese herbs in my home garden. Purple and green leaf tia to (red perilla) and lemongrass-y kinh gioi (Vietnamese balm) are my favorites. I feed and nurture my perennial rau ram (Vietnamese coriander) so that it will flourish when the summer heat hits.

Tia to and kinh gioi often get buggy when I plant them together so over the years I've learned to space them far apart. Tia to goes into a whiskey barrel and kinh gioi is planted in the ground outside my front door. Every morning, I look at the kinh gioi plant to make sure that it's doing well. This morning, I had a feeling that our local gopher was going to attack the plant. Last year, the gopher ate the plant and I thought it was because it had been mistaken for a volunteer potato plant nearby, which the gopher ate too. I cleared the area this year of the potato but low and behold, there was a scrawny plant that popped up. "What is that thing next to the kinh gioi?" my hubby, Rory, asked yesterday.  I saw the potato plant but didn't yank it. This afternoon, Rory awoke from his nap and something looked different outside the living room window. That darn gopher ate both the potato and kinh gioi! The lesson here? Yank the potato and/or plant the herb in a pot! All that's left now is some roughed up soil -- as the photo on the left shows. ARGGHH.

Guess I'll be heading back to the Thien Thanh grocery store in San Jose for another plant. If you're looking for Viet herbs to plant, head to a Vietnamese market and ask. You may even find vendors selling starters right outside the door!

Gardening Tips
To keep pests away from my Vietnamese herbs, I sprinkle Sluggo -- small white pellets made of natural stuff that won't harm your pets but will keep pesky snails at bay. For bugs that like to gnaw on the heady leaves, I regularly spray the plants with Safer, a safe (get the name?!) insecticidal soap. To nurture the plants, I feed them with Dr. Earth, a fabulous dry fertilizer.  Of course, regular watering helps all of these plants.

Harvesting Vietnamese herbs
Pinch them back to get the plants nice and bushy. When harvesting, snip a good sprig so that the plant will bush out instead of get tall and leggy -- which won't yield many leaves. As the plants begin to flower, snip off the flowers to encourage the plants to put energy towards producing leaves, not flowers.

Save Seeds
At the end of the season in fall, let the plants flower and go to seed. Collect the seeds and save them or sprinkle them into the soil for next year's crop.

More Information
For details on Vietnamese herbs (e.g., botanical names, descriptions, photos, seed sources, and storage tips) visit the Vietnamese Herb Primer page on the main Viet World Kitchen website!

Coconut Milk

Think coconut milk is bad for you? Think again. Here's the skinny on coconut milk.

Indeed, it's high in saturated fat, but a number of independent studies have shown that its saturated fat is a good one. It isn't hydrogenated (not a trans fatty acid) and the chief fatty acid, lauric acid, is easily metabolized, which means it doesn't hang ar ound to become bad cholesterol. A fatty acid that has been found to be antiviral, antifungal, and antimicrobial, lauric acid is also abundant in mother's milk. Most importantly, coconut milk is the backbone of many cuisines around the world. For generations, people have led healthy lives with foods enriched by coconut milk. There's no reason why you can't either, so long as it's as part of a balanced diet. Go ahead and live a little!

In the Vietnamese repertoire, coconut milk is associated with southern cooking because that's where coconut palms flourish; the geography and weather of the central and northern regions are not great for coconuts. Coconut milk is indispensable for southern Viet treats like Indian-style curries, sweet soup snacks called che, and banh xeo sizzling crepes.

In Vietnam, coconut milk is mostly freshly made. (There are grocery stores opening up and so there's bound to be canned coconut milk too!) To prepare fresh coconut milk, brown, mature (hairy!) coconuts are used -- not the green, young coconuts whose clear liquid is sipped through a straw for a refreshing drink. The coconut is cracked open, drained of its water (which is fine to drink as long as it hasn't fermented), and then the white meat is grated using a sharp serrated metal blade or a wood stool that has the blade attached to it. The grated meat is steeped in hot water (4:3 ratio of coconut meat to water works well) and squeezed through cloth to extract the creamy milk. The first extraction is the best, but cooks may resteep the flesh for a lesser quality, thin milk. Freshly prepared coconut milk has a wonderful subtle sweetness. Making it in the US and elsewhere where coconuts don't grow well can be hard because good coconut are difficult to find. In general, choose among the heavy small ones because they are likely to have more flesh and less water. Shake the coconut to make sure there sloshing water inside, or else the coconut is spoiled.

I don't make fresh coconut milk often and mainly rely on canned coconut milk, which is excellent. In particular, I recommend Chao Koh or Mae Ploy brands. Available at most Asian markets, both are creamy and rich. Mae Ploy is actually creamier. When you've got extra coconut milk, freeze it for another day. NEVER use insipid light coconut milk. And avoid coconut milk that contains weird emulsifiers that keep it smooth. Read labels!