Recipes

Fried silver whiting in a makrut lime batter, served with a kohlrabi and sugar snap pea slaw and a tamarind dipping sauce. Give it to me fried with a whole lot of punchy aromatics, some rice and a fresh slaw and sauce and I’m in heaven.

  A fast yet flavourful Vietnamese homestyle dish where chicken thigh is braised in a caramel sauce with lots of ginger.   Ingredients Chicken ...

A beautiful Vietnamese stuffed cabbage soup where you use the outer cabbage leaves as to wrap the parcels stuffed with meat as well as a spring onion stalk to tie and secure it. Traditionally, it’s made with a simple pork filling but I love loading it up with prawn, carrot and mushrooms to pack as much flavour as possible.

Normally a Vietnamese soup (canh) is served as a side dish alongside a few other dishes (a stir fry, stew, vegetables) with rice as part of a meal, but you could eat this on its own too.

I added some rice to my bowl before pouring in the soup and parcels to make it a hearty, comforting meal.

This is one of my favourite traditional Vietnamese recipes. Think of it as a quintessential Vietnamese Surf’n’Turf. The pork belly gives it the fat and richness, the prawn makes it sweet and the rice paper rolls are filled with lots of fresh herbs (Vietnamese mint, mint, coriander, garlic chives), cucumber and lettuce.

‘Bún’ means rice vermicelli noodles and ‘tôm nướng’ translates to grilled prawns, so this dish simply means ‘Grilled prawn vermicelli’.

I grew up on this dish and whilst my parents use to grill the prawns whole with the shells on, I’ve realised butterflying the prawns instead gives you a best of both worlds solution where the prawn flesh still gets cooked on the shells, the marinade is able to soak into the flesh easier and then you can also remove the cooked prawn from the shells a lot easier. It takes an extra few minutes to butterfly the prawns, but it’s worth it and is now the only way I cook grilled prawns.

A fresh, tangy and crunchy vegetarian take on the classic bánh mì. This is the perfect dish for a hearty brunch or quick lunch, and you can even prep some of the elements beforehand!

Broken Rice/Cơm Tấm is the ultimate comfort food and what I default to making at home during the week when I want a comforting Vietnamese meal. It’s called broken rice and is a beautiful leftovers dish because traditionally, old/broken rice grains were used to make the rice component. This dish is served with an array of bits and pieces you’d have at home to turn it into a meal: a grilled protein (normally a marinated pork chop),  sliced cucumber or tomato, pickled carrots and daikon, a fried egg and in other instances, a Vietnamese meatloaf and this delicious pork floss which takes a bit of time to prepare. If you order this dish at a restaurant you will also usually be served a clear soup to have alongside it. In my version that I make at home, I’ve kept it simple with elements you can make in advance so you can whip up this dish at a moment’s notice. You can make a batch of Vietnamese Dipping Sauce and pickled vegetables to keep in your fridge on standby and you can also pre-marinate the pork chops and freeze portions that you can simply defrost and cook when you want. The fried egg, cucumber and spring onion oil are components that you can also quickly prepare in the assembly process or as your rice cooks. 

Finally on rice, as I mentioned, traditionally broken rice is used which is harder to source and doesn’t necessarily taste as good as jasmine rice. To keep it simple I just cook jasmine rice as my per usual process. But if you like the broken rice aesthetic of little tiny grains, you can place them into your food processor and break the grains before cooking.

A fresh, fragrant and flavour packed Vietnamese dish, originating from Hanoi.

This Pork and Prawn Salad is a refreshing, filling and delicious dish that really highlights South East Asian cuisine. The use of two proteins, pork for fat and prawn for sweetness come together to create the OG ‘surf and turf’ flavour pairing, the salad has all different kinds of wonderful crunchy textures and finally the dressing is the iconic flours of salty, sour, sweet & spicy. It’s all about the marriage of flavours that come together to create something balanced, harmonious and delicious!

Traditionally this salad is served with fried prawn crackers, however I’ve opted for a favourite, Vietnamese black sesame rice cracker which is an easier and healthier option to make at home. Rather than frying in oil, I’ve learnt to just microwave it for 1 minute and it will puff up into an edible bowl that you can then serve the salad in.

This is my family recipe for ‘Bánh Xèo’ or Vietnamese Sizzling Crepes. It's a Southern Vietnamese dish, which is essentially a fresh and crispy savoury crepe best enjoyed wrapped in lettuce and herbs and dipped in Nuoc Cham, a Vietnamese Dipping Sauce. It’s the perfect spring and spritzy dish!

This is one of my favourite Vietnamese recipes that I grew up eating, and still love to this day!  Makes- 40 spring rolls, Vermicelli Bun Bowls ...

Serves- 4 as a main, 6 as a starterIngredients- 15Cooking Time- 45 minutesSkill Level- Easy Ingredients 1 packet (50 wrappers/250g) of spring ro...