There are so many Vietnamese restaurants in Winnipeg. I heard about Pho No 1 from some other Indonesian friends. One time, I was meeting up one Indonesian foodie who lives in Winnipeg as well. Fitri was suggesting to meet at Nou Eul Tor, a Korean restaurant on Sargent. However, the restaurant was closed on Tuesday, so we decided to go to another Asian restaurant. She said let's try Rice Bowl, a Filipino, Chinese and Vietnamese restaurant. I was more interested to try one dish of Vietnamese there. When I took a look the menu, both of us were saying the same "not many Vietnamese choices here". I said let's move to Pho No 1 since Fitri likes this place better.

The room was full, only one table was empty. The waiter was asking us to sit there. We finally sat down inside Pho No 1 and read the menu. I observed the place and people. Most of the customers were non Caucasians, but I did see some Caucasians.

After about 3 minutes, I saw there was another empty table which close to the window. I requested to move to that table.

After flipping some pages on the menu, I decided to go for a bowl of Bun Bo Noung (Rice Vermicelli and Grilled Beef). The beef was seasoned perfectly and tender. This place has reasonable prices with bigger portions too. I definitely will go back there to try other Vietnamese dishes. This place is always packed during lunch and dinner time, so you may avoid those hours.

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Summer is almost over, but we still do grilling or barbecuing, don't we? After choosing several different Vietnamese recipes from Vietnamese bloggers that I trust for its authenticity, I decided to go for B� Nu?ng L� L?t (B� = Beef, Nu?ng = Grill, L� L?t = Wild Betel Leaf). Other names for L� L?t are:
- Botanical Names: Piper sarmentosum/ Charvica Sarmentosa/Piper difusum
- English: Wild Betel Leaf
- Indonesian: Daun Sirih Dudu/Tanah, Daun Cabean, Daun Karuk, Daun Karok, Amelaunune, Gafutofure, or Kado-kado
- Malaysian and Singaporean: Daun Kaduk or Daun Kadok

The leaves contain high in antioxidant and can be used as a herbal medicine for asthma and cough. If you live in Winnipeg and wonder where you can get it, there are two Asian stores that sell it, Lucky (on Winnipeg ave.) and Dong Thai (on Notre Dame ave.)

Don't get confused with L� Tr�u (Piper betle L.)! L� Tr�u is known as betel leaf in English and a popular leaf for chewing in traditional South East Asian culture. In Indonesia, betel leaf (daun sirih) has been approved as traditional feminine hygiene.

Back to my Vietnamese dish here, I compared three different recipes from Wandering Chopsticks, Viet World Kitchen and Ravenous Couple. Thank you folks for the recipes!

I made two different seasonings, one was with Chinese five spices and another one was with curry powder. Sun brand curry powder is Andrea's recommendation for this. However, I used the Jamaican curry powder instead. At least, I am still on the track of curry. I didn't try to say that pho is Thai soup and substituted banh pho for angel hair pasta as Rachel Ray did. Speaking about that, my husband threw his sarcastic comment, "if it's not Chinese or Japanese then it's got to be Thai." If you don't know what I'm talking about, please read on Andrea's post of "How funky is Rachel Ray�s Phunky Pho?"

This recipe goes for Delicious Vietnamese #5, hosted by Anh Nguyen of A Food Lover's Journey.



B� Nu?ng L� L?t
- Vietnamese Grilled Beef in Wild Betel Leaf -
Makes 25 to 30 rolls

Ingredients:
1 lb ground beef (divide into two for two different seasonings), chuck preferred

Seasoning option #1:
2 tbsp minced green onions, green and white part
1 tsp Chinese five spices (ngo hiang)
1 tsp fish sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground black pepper

Seasoning option #2:
2 tbsp minced green onions, green and white part
1/2 tbsp curry powder
1 tablespoons finely minced lemongrass (At Asian stores, you can find minced frozen lemongrass ready to use)
1 tsp fish sauce
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground black pepper



Methods:
1. You will need two bowl and fingers to mix. In bowl #1, combine beef with green onions, Chinese five spices, fish sauce, soy sauce, pepper and salt; mix well and set aside in fridge. In bowl #2, combine fish, green onions, curry powder, lemongrass, fish sauce salt and black pepper; mix well and set aside in the fridge while you are preparing the leaves.

2. Use scissors or tootpicks to detach the leaves from their center stems. Make sure to keep the leaf stem attached to the leaf. You�ll need it later for creating the rolls.

3. To make the rolls, put a leaf on your work surface, matted side up and glossy side facing down. Take a bit of meat (about 1 tbsp) and use your hand to shape it into a small sausage of sorts.

4. Roll up the meat in the leaf, make sure that the length of the meat doesn't exceed the width of the leaf and use the little stem to seal it up. The roll will keep its shape. Place the finished roll on a baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining leaves until all the beef is used. To view how to roll this little sausage, Andrea has given step by step pictures on her blog.

5. Grill them until done. There are multiple options to grill them; over small charcoal ovens, grill by using skewers or a grilling basket or broil in the oven for about 6-8 minutes, turning a few times to prevent the leaves from burning.

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I was first interested to b�nh tr�i when I saw pictures of Vietnamese foods that taken by one of Indonesian foodies during his travel to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) and Hanoi. At one of his pictures, he stated that he forgot the food name and described how it tasted. Then, I was asking Anh what that was and she explained it to me.

B�nh Tr�i is actually similar to Indonesian klepon. While in some parts of Sumatra, people call it onde-onde which is the same as the Malaysians do. The difference, klepon is covered with grated coconut and filled with palm sugar or coconut sugar. B�nh tr�i is sprinkled with roasted sesame seed and sugarcane rock candy as its filling.  Yep! Most of Asian countries have their own sticky rice dumplings!  Shame on me! I haven't made my own klepon yet.^_^

Short story, I was browsing the recipe for it. I found two recipes which one was in Vietnamese and another one was in English. The one in English was to complicated to follow. I decided to choose the Vietnamese one. For the first time, I was following a recipe that is not in the language that I speak. Off course, I used google translate. Even though google didn't translate to a proper English, I quite understood with the recipe.

Since those two recipes are slightly different in ingredient. One is with a mix of glutinous rice and rice flours and another one is only with rice flour. Again, I bugged Anh to make sure that I got the correct flours. She mentioned the ratio 9:1 for sticky rice flour and rice flour. Thanks, Anh!

One thing, I changed from the recipe. The recipe applies sugarcane rock candy for the filling. I used Indonesian palm sugar (known as gula aren) that has a darker colour since I don't have any sugarcane rock candy.

This post goes for Delicious Vietnam #4 and is hosted by Bonnibella

B�nh Tr�i
- Vietnamese Glutinous Rice Dumplings -
recipe by Trang Emi, modified by me
 
Ingredients:
180 g (1 cup + 1 tbsp) glutinous rice flour
20 g (3 tbsp + 1/4 tsp) rice flour
190 ml warm water
palm sugar (depends on how much filling you want)
roasted sesame seed

Directions:
1. Combine glutinous rice flour and rice flour. Add warm water gradually to flour mix. Mix well and form into a dough ball--it should be like play dough consistency.

2. Take a small dough and shape into a ball. Repeat the earlier step until all dough is shaped into small balls. From this recipe, you will get about 35-40 small balls.

3. Pinch a small ball of dough and flatten it out into a thin disk.

4. Place a small amount of palm sugar and close the dough around it.

5. Meanwhile, you are busy with shaping the little balls. In a pot, bring water a boil. Once you�ve covered an entire plate and your water is boiling and your little ball soldiers are starting to stick.

6. Plunk your balls into boiling water and wait until they float to the surface.

7. Prepare a bowl with cold icy water on the side. Once the balls are floating, with a slotted spoon or spider, transfer them right away to the a bowl of cold water. Place on a serving plate and sprinkle roasted sesame seed.

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A post of A Food Lover's Journey for Delicious Vietnam #2 announcement caught my attention. I asked her if I'm allowed to participate since I am just a fan of Vietnamese food. So, I decided to be a part of Delicious Vietnam #2 who is hosted by Ravenous Couple.

To be honest, I didn't know about Vietnamese dish until I moved to Winnnipeg. I have tried many of the food from some Vietnamese restaurants in town. As Vietnam is part of South East Asian, some of the dishes are similar to Indonesian ones.

After the making process was done, I'm very satisfied with the result as it tasted damn close with the restaurant ones!  Thanks so much to Wandering Chopstick for all the recipes that I used here.

The vermicelli is assembly with Tom Nuong (Grilled Shrimp) and Cha Ram (Vietnamese Shrimp Egg Rolls). Compare to Indonesian lumpia, cha ram is very simple to make.

I made the Nuoc Mam Cham (Fish Dipping Sauce) and Do Chua (Pickled) a head of time in jars and store them in the fridge. I use sap vinegar instead of white vinegar for both of these condiments. I'm not a big fan of white vinegar. Whenever there is a recipe call for white vinegar, I always substitute for nypa (Indonesia: cuka aren/nipa) or canesugar vinegar (Indonesian: cuka lahang).


Bun Tom Nuong Cha Ram
- Vietnamese Rice Vermicelli with Grilled Shrimp and Shrimp Egg Rolls -
recipe by Wandering Chopsticks
 
Ingredients:
rice vermicelli

Tom Nuong
400 g shrimps
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 shallot, minced
2 tsp fish sauce, add more to taste
1 tsp ground black pepper

Cha Ram
as many shrimps as you like
as many green onions as you like
spring roll wrappers
a pinch of salt

Nuoc Mam Cham 
1 cup water
1/2 cup Nuoc Mam (Vietnamese Fish Sauce)
1/2 cup nypa or canesugar vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
bird eyes chilies, crushed

Do Chua
1 medium-sized carrot, julienned
1 small daikon, julienned
1 tblsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 to 1/2 cup nypa/canesugar vinegar


Directions:
Bun
Do as the package direction says so.

Tom Nuong
1. Combine all ingredients for Tom Nuong. Let them sit for 30 minutes.
2. Grill shrimps until done.

Cha Ram
1. Peel and devein shrimps; sprinkle a pinch of salt over them and mix thoroughly. Roughly chop shrimps.
2. Slice the green onions into 2-inch pieces or on the diagonal.
3. Combine shrimps and green onions.
4. Place on wraps and roll (see how to wrap egg roll)
5. Deep fry until golden brown.

Nuoc Mam Cham
1. Boil 1/2 cup water. Actually, you don't have to boil the water, just get it hot so that it can dissolve the sugar more easily.
2. Stir in 1/2 cup vinegar, 1/2 cup fish sauce, and 1/2 cup sugar.
3. Taste and adjust if necessary. Add crushed chili peppers if you wish spicy taste. Store in a jar and keep it in the fridge.

The taste should be slightly sweet and rather mild, the pungency of the fish sauce quite muted.

Do Chua
1. After julienning the vegetables, spread them out in a shallow bowl.
2. Sprinkle just enough sugar for a light coating. Add a smidgen of salt. Pour enough vinegar to submerge about half the vegetables.
3. After 15 minutes or so, stir the vegetables so the vinegar is mixed. The carrots and daikon should be lightly pickled after about half an hour.
4. Store extra pickles in a glass jar and pour the extra vinegar in the jar. Add enough vinegar to fill the jar halfway and fill up the rest with water. Screw the lid on tightly. Store in fridge.

Time to assembly:
In a bowl, put rice vermicelli. Top with tom noung, any vegetables that you like (in this case, I added bean sprouts), do chua, cha ram and any herbs as you wish. The herbs can be cilantro, rau ram (Vietnamese coriander leaves) or Thai basil.

In another small bowl, place nuoc nam cham.

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