Introduction Of Vietnamese Cuisine

What is Vietnamese Cuisine? A unique blend of cultural influences has created food with its own distinct personality

In simple terms, Vietnamese food is lighter and more refreshing than Thai food - using crisp, uncooked vegetables, subtle seasonings, raw herbs, and unique flavor combinations. Often described as textural, with fresh, sharp flavors, it is also more tropical and fragrant than Chinese food.
At the heart of Vietnamese cuisine, with its hearty kick and unique aroma, is the salty, pale brown fermented fish sauce known as nuoc mam. The cuisines of Cambodia, Thailand and Burma use a similar sauce, however the Vietnamese variety seems to have a more pungent flavor.

Mandatory in Vietnamese cooking, nuoc mam is made by layering fresh anchovies with salt in huge wooden barrels. This process takes about six months and involves pouring the liquid which drips from the barrel back over the layers of anchovies. The grading of nuoc mam is as sophisticated as the grading of fine olive oils. Arguably, the best nuoc mam comes from the island of Phu Quoc, close to the Cambodian border. A bowl of steaming rice topped with this fragrant sauce is a culinary treat in itself. Nuoc mam in its purest form has a strong smell and incredibly salty flavor which renders it an ac­quired taste for non-Vietnamese. It is certainly stronger than Thai nam pla and is used in mari­nades and sauces, for dressing salads and in cook­ing. Vietnamese rarely ex­pect a foreigner to enjoy the taste, but are delighted when one does. Easier on the unaccustomed palate is nuoc mam cham, which is the ubiquitous dip made of nuoc mam diluted with lime juice, vinegar, water, crushed garlic and-fresh red chilies. Nuoc mam cham is used as a dipping sauce on the table, served with dishes like cha gio (spring rolls) and chao tom (sugar cane shrimps), or simply as a dip for pieces of fish or meat.

What also sets the cuisine apart from that of other Southeast Asian countries is the pervasive use of fresh leaves and herbs, which come in as many as a dozen different varieties. The use of dill in cha ca, Hanoi's famous fish dish served at the popular Cha Ca La Vong restaurant in the city's. Old Quarter, and also in fish congee, is likely borrowed from the French, however the extensive use of a variety of raw herbs nevertheless seems uniquely Vietnamese.

While Vietnamese restaurants in other regions of the world rarely manage to offer more than one kind of mint, basil or cilantro, markets throughout Vietnam sell a remarkable variety of herbs. Several varieties of the mint and basil family do not grow outside the country, and there are also some unusual, full-flavored leaves, like the deep-red spicy perilla leaf, tia to, and the pungent saw-leaf herb or long coriander that are specific to the cuisine as well.

Every pho shop has a huge plate of raw herbs set on each table, and a large plate also appears with an array of dishes, from grilled, marinated beef to cha dum (a type of pate). But what do you do with the herbs? Sometimes, as in the case of pho, they are stirred into the steaming soup; with other dishes they are used as wrappers, together with rice papers or lettuces, and are featured in Vietnamese shrimp and chicken salads. The herbs are also served with ban xeo, a kind of crepe enclosing shrimp,  pork,  mung beans and bean sprouts. Certainly the use of these fresh herbs and leafy green vegetables is part of the appeal of Vietnamese food, providing fresh flavors, beautiful aromas and many interesting textural variations.

Other factors which contribute to the subtlety and uniqueness of Vietnamese food are the refined cooking techniques, the often unusual serving of varying dishes and the combination of flavors.

Imperial Cuisine

Dozens of sophisticated dishes fit for an emperor
Hue, situated on the banks of the tranquil Perfume River, is the third most visited Vietnamese city after Saigon and Hanoi. Once an important seat of learning and culture, as well as the imperial seat for nearly 150 years, it is slowly being rediscovered. This rather sleepy place is also the very city which once inspired the creation of the most sophisticated Vietnamese cuisine, and took vegetarian cuisine to even greater heights than those reached by masterful Chinese chefs.

Hue traditionally served as a cultural, educational and religious center - it is the site of the country's most important Buddhist monasteries and temples - but from 1802 to 1945 it was also the political capital of Vietnam, under the thirteen emperors of the Nguyen Dynasty. Major tourist attractions such as the Imperial Palace and the emperors' tombs still suggest a time of great affluence. Emperor Tu Duc (1848-1883), for example, whose expansive tomb reflects his once-opulent lifestyle, is said to have demanded that his morning tea be made only from the drops of water collected by his servants from lotus leaves on the lake within the Imperial City.

A typical imperial banquet today would include perhaps a dozen dishes, such as a beautifully fragrant, peppery chicken soup with lotus seeds (sup ga), crisp, golden brown spring rolls (nem ran), delicate rice flour patties stuffed with minced shrimp (banh Hue), grilled pork in rice paper (thit nuong) served with a tasty peanut sauce, delicious crab claws stuffed with pork (cua phich bot), and the famous minced shrimp wrapped around sugar cane (chao tom lui mia), known in the south as chao tom. Main dishes might include fish grilled in banana leaf (ca nuong la chuoi), grilled beef in wild betel leaves (bo la lot), rice with vegetables (com Hue), gently sauteed shrimp with mushrooms (tom xao hanh nam), and finally the glutinous rice dessert, which comes in a perfectly formed little box made from coconut leaf. Its name literally translates as husband-and-wife cake (phu the).

These dishes are actually variations of those served in other parts of Vietnam, and the ingredients may be simple vegetables, eggs or fish, rather than exotic sea delicacies or the best cuts of meat. What sets these dishes apart is the sophisticated cooking techniques and the presentation.

For example, the favorite chao tom lui mia seems so simple you would never guess the complexity of its preparation. The tiny shrimp are carefully shelled before marinating in nuoc mam. After washing, they are pounded until they form a thick paste, to which egg white, onion, garlic, sugar and pepper are added. The mixture is pounded again with a touch of pork fat, and finally wrapped around sugar cane sticks and grilled.

Appearance was very important, not only in the use of color and the arrangement of food on the plate, but also in the manner of serving. Rice, for example, might have been draped with a generous omelet coat, or cooked inside a lotus leaf and further enhanced with the addition of delicate lotus seeds. Chefs also experimented with unusual ingredients such as green banana and unripe figs, banana flowers and green corn, which until then had been considered unpalatable.

The most talented proponents of imperial cuisine today are virtually all women, each of them descended by some route or other from imperial households. Skills were painstakingly passed down in extended families, with young cooks-to-be encouraged to first observe an experienced cook before being invited to try their hand at actual preparation.

Due to its size and relatively small population, Hue today is not a culinary mecca compared with Ho Chi Minh City or Hanoi. There is, however, a renewed interest in the cuisine of Hue, and a number of modern Vietnamese chefs have made it their mission to turn the simple art of cooking into something extraordinary, and restore imperial cuisine to its former glory.

Home-style Cooking

A personal approach to experiencing the essence of Vietnamese cooking

A soft rain falls as dusk approaches, as so often happens in Vietnam. The suburban streets, lined with houses and gardens, are quiet but for a few workers on their way home. Moving away from the main streets into a maze of alleys designed for motorbikes rather than cars, past the vendor selling baguettes door-to-door from a cart, we reach Tuyen's house. In the large but sparsely decorated living room, Tuyen's husband is watching television with their delightful four-year-old daughter, already in her pajamas, and their brother-in-law from the countryside. He is here visiting his eight-year-old daughter who lives with Tuyen's family in the town of Hue because he, a widower, does not earn enough money to support her. This is not unusual in Vietnam - those with higher incomes take care of those who earn less. It is a happy family scene, and they are all beginning to enjoy the smell of cooking coming from the next room.

Tuyen, slim and elegant, is chopping mushrooms and carrots into tiny cubes on a large wooden board. A talented dressmaker, by day she cuts fabric on the sturdy wooden table which takes up almost the entire room. However, tonight the table is laden with fruit, vegetables, meat and fish fresh from Hue's central market along the side of the river. A pot of gently bubbling water is on a two-ring burner. Tuyen usually cooks in the kitchen under the light of a single bulb, but she did not think that would be appropriate on this occasion.

Tonight she has promised to teach me how to cook Vietnamese food, an arrangement made by my marvelous guide Mai, who is her best friend. I arrive on the back of Mai's 50cc motorbike - a common mode of transportation - followed behind by her niece, a 19-year-old learning English at evening school, in the hope of one day becoming a tour guide. She has been commandeered to help with preparation of a very special dinner, which few would undertake during the week. Tuyen is, I am assured by Mai, the most accomplished home cook in Hue, and even then it takes even her a full morning, with two helpers, to prepare a traditionally Hue Sunday lunch.

So what do I learn? I learn that before stuffing a cabbage leaf, it is dipped into boiling water to soften it and remove any bitterness. To soften grated carrot, it is mixed vigorously with salt and then rinsed. To extract the maximum juice from a tiny Vietnamese lime, it is rolled like a piece of dough across a hard surface before squeezing. When boiling king beans, continually remove the foam that forms at the edges of the pan. These are the types of detail Tuyen tells me everyone in Vietnam knows, but it is difficult to believe that there are many people who can carry out these tasks with the dexterity of her slim, strong, and highly competent fingers.

Mai's niece is in charge of preparing the purple banana flower, but through lack of experience cuts it the wrong way. But Tuyen does not panic; she selects some pieces for deep-frying in a wheat flour batter, while the remainder is mixed with just a squeeze of lime and some crushed, roasted peanuts for a wonderfully nutty-tasting salad.

I also learn that tapioca dough is nice to touch, easy to work with, and however much you knead it, it never loses its perfect smoothness - it also takes a long time to prepare. Mai, adamant that she cannot cook, spends almost the entire evening rolling the dough into little balls and stuffing flattened disks (barely larger than a coin) with steamed mung beans seasoned with salt and pepper, or coating roasted peanuts and tiny pieces of coconut in the same dough. The secret is to work with such a thin piece of dough that when each banh hot loc (tapioca starch cake) is cooked - about five minutes in boiling water until the pieces float to the top - you achieve a translucence that means you can almost see what is inside. Once cooked, they are immediately plunged into cold water to prevent them from sticking together. Other banh bot loc we stuff with a single shrimp, a little pork fat and black pepper, this time forming the creations into crescent shapes, then frying them in oil with salt and a little nuoc mam.

Tuyen is not only a good cook, she is a good teacher as well. Her four-year-old daughter already knows how to stuff banh hot loe, but to play with the peanuts, rather than wrap them, is as much a temptation for this little girl as it would be for a child anywhere.

I learn how to fold rice paper in triangles around a stuffing of carrot, vermicelli noodles, and wood ear mushrooms, with a single shrimp on the top - the tail of which I am to leave sticking out at the top to give this variation on the spring roll the reason for its name, tom phi Hen, which translates literally as flying shrimp spring roll. Unfortunately, it turns out that I am unable to wrap the rolls to Tuyen's high standards; she is concerned that if she does not re-wrap my efforts, there is a chance that the roll will disintegrate while frying.

Then Tuyan shows me how to make cabbage stuffed with carrot. I mix sugar into the softened, grated carrot, until the sugar has all but disappeared, finally adding some crushed garlic. The rolling process using cabbage is marginally easier than using rice paper, but it has to be rolled tight enough so that the rolls can be cut into colorful slices. I find the carrot slightly too sweet for my taste, but am amazed at the firm texture achieved by rolling each leaf so painstakingly tight.

Finally, I have learned how challenging and time-consuming preparing the food can be, the importance of the subtle details, and what a rewarding experience cooking genuine Vietnamese food can be.
As we sit down to dine in true Vietnamese family-style and enjoy the rewards of Tuyen's masterful cooking, I discover that eating in Vietnam is a shared experience, an informal ritual. On the small table that the family has gathered around is a large bowl of steaming rice, a cauldron of aromatic soup, and a generous plate of leaves that each of us wrap around a delicious hand roll and dip into the nuoc mam cham. Yet, as unique as this experience is to me, I realize that it is simply a typical meal for many Vietnamese families.