Cauliflower and Shrimp Stir-Fry

I don’t often cook cauliflower but this is one of the dishes I do like.  The longest cooking time is the cauliflower – very dependent on how large you cut the florets.  I prefer the cauliflower to be on the firmer side with a slight crunch to it still.  Vary the cooking time dependent on how you like your vegetables cooked.

Cauliflower and Shrimp Stir-Fry
(Serves 4-6)

• 5 tbsp olive oil
• 4 chopped cloves of garlic
• 1 lb of shrimp, peeled
• ½ tsp salt
• black pepper to taste
• 1 head of cauliflower, cut into florets
• ¼ cup water
• 1/2 onion, cut pole to pole
• 5 tbsp fish sauce
• 2 tsp chopped chives/green onions
• cilantro for garnish

1.      Heat 2 tsp oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat and stir in garlic.  Be sure you have a lid for the skillet.

2.      Add peeled shrimp,  salt and pepper.  Stir-fry for 3-4 minutes until shrimp is half –way cooked.  Set shrimp aside in a bowl.

3.      Add 3 tsp of oil to skillet then the cauliflower florets and stir-fry for 5 minutes.

4.      Add water to pan and cover with lid, cook over medium heat for 10 minutes.

5.      Add onion to the stir-fry and stir-fry for another 2 minutes.

6.      Add the stir-fried shrimp, fish sauce and green onions.  Stir-fry until shrimp is fully cooked.

7.      Garnish with cilantro.

  

Cauliflower and Shrimp Stir-Fry, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Tips on Making Vietnamese Eggrolls

The most visited page on my blog would have to be the Vietnamese Eggroll recipe.  Given the popularity of Vietnamese eggrolls, I thought I would help the newbies to begin the journey of making eggrolls. Here’s the link to the recipe for reference:

http://simplyvietnamese.wordpress.com/2008/04/13/vietnamese-egg-rolls-cha-gio/

Key Asian Ingredients:

I suspect of one of the major barriers to making the eggrolls is buying the ingredients.  It can be intimidating walking into an Asian market trying to find the ingredients without being able to read the labels or know which brand is the good brand.  Attached is a picture of the key ingredients but I will also list it out and share with you my brand preference if applicable:

• Dried vermicilli (Bean Thread) – Red Dragon brand
• Dried black fungus/mushrooms/ – No preference
• Fish sauce (nuoc mam) – One Crab brand (Hon Phan Thiet)
• Oyster sauce – Panda brand
• Rice paper (banh trang) – Red Rose brand
• Rice noodle (bun) – Bun Thap Chua brand

Chopped Vegetables:

There’s a short cut…this should decrase 15 minutes of prep time! Use 2 bags of cole slaw vegetable mix, in the pre-made section. Of course, the jicama won’t be in the pre-made mix but a small compromise for saving time.

Preparation Ahead of Time:

You can make the eggroll stuffing ahead of time as long as you leave out the fresh vegetables (carrots, cabbage, jicama).  This can be refrigerated a day ahead or frozen.  When you are ready to make the eggrolls, incorporate the veggies into the meat mix.

Happy eggroll making! I hope this helps…let me know.

 

     

Vietnamese Eggroll Ingredients, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Mustard Greens Soup (Canh Cải)

If you live in the South, you are familiar with mustard greens.   This is a Vietnamese twist on mustard green.  This soup has very bright flavor due to the ginger and is great for a light summer meal especially during the work week.  Of course, you have to have rice with this…

Mustard Greens Soup (Canh Cải)

Serves 4-6

½ lb of ground turkey or pork

1 tsp salt

½ tsp crushed black pepper

½ cup diced onion

8 cups of water

1 tsp finely grated ginger

1 lb of mustard greens, washed and roughly cut

2-3 tbsp fish sauce

 

1.  Heat a large pot pan over medium high heat. Add ground meat, season with salt and pepper and sauté until slightly golden brown.

2.  Add the grated ginger to the meat and sauté for another minute to release the ginger flavor.

3.  Add water and fish sauce and bring to a boil.

4. Add cut mustard greens and bring to a simmer for 10 minutes.

5.  Serve with hot rice.

 

 

Mustard Greens Soup (Canh Cải), originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Pickled Mustard Greens Soup

Pickled mustard greens (cải chua) can be made at home or purchased at the Asian market.  The mustard greens are of the Asian variety – thicker leaves and not curly at the end like the American variety.  The recipe for making homemade cải chua will be the subject of a future blog!  Today, I’m focused on making soup with pickled mustard greens.

The soup will be on the salty and sour side – easy on the fish sauce since the pickling process will have added plenty of sodium.

Any cut of beef you have will be fine, just adjust the cooking time to ensure the meat is tender.  Sliced beef is the best choice I think.  Angus beef stew cut will be fine as long as you slow simmer the meat for about an hour and add two more cups of water – more cooking time with cheaper cuts of meat.  Others, may choose to use ground pork or beef.

Pickled Mustard Greens Soup (Canh Cải Chua)

Serves 4-6

1 tsp olive oil

1 lb sliced beef/beef stew

1 tsp salt

½ tsp crushed black pepper

1 large tomato, quartered

½ cup diced onion

8 cups of water

2 packages or 4 cups of pickled mustard greens, roughly chopped

2-3 tbsp fish sauce

 

1.  Heat a medium size pan with olive oil, braise the beef over high heat and season with salt and pepper.  Braise until slightly brown on both sides.

2.  Add to braised beef, tomatoes and diced onion.  Stir-fry for 2-3 minutes.

3.  Add water, pickled mustard greens and fish sauce to the pan and bring to a boil. 

4. Reduce heat to medium to low heat to maintain a slow simmer for 30 minutes. 

 

Pickled Mustard Greens Soup, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Rau Đai

As promised a few weeks ago, I’m following up with a photo of rau đai to help identify it.  Finally saw it come in at the local Asian market.  Definitely, not something you would find at the Western grocery store.  The leaves are very thin and textured like mint, edge of leaves have ridges.

I’m only familiar this as a soup with dried or fresh shrimp – made the same way as canh mồng tơi.  One of my summer favorites – over a steaming hot bowl of rice.

To prepare the soup, pluck the leaves from the stem and use only the leaves.  Similar to okra, when cooked it makes the soup slimy.  I think it’s an acquired taste! 

Oh, don’t forget to put the rice on ahead of time.  This comes together in 10-15 minutes max!

Canh Rau Đai

Serves 4-6

8 cups of water

2/3 cup of dried shrimp

1 bunch of washed and rau đai leaves removed from stems

1/2 cup chopped onion

1 tsp salt

1 ½  tbsp shrimp paste

crushed black pepper to taste

 

1.  Soak dried shrimp in 1 cup of warm water bath for 20-30 minutes.  Drain shrimp and save the liquid.  Place shrimp into a food processor, pulse grind until the shrimp is broken up into small pieces.

2.  In a medium size pan, add 7 cups of liquid and the remaining liquid used to soak the shrimp.  Bring to a boil.

3.  Add chopped onion and salt to stock.

4.  Add rau đai leaves to stock and bring to boil over medium high heat.

5.  Quickly stir the soup and add the shrimp paste.  Bring soup to boil for 1-2 minutes, when the rau đai is wilted.

6.  Ladle soup over a bowl of steaming, rice.

 

 

     

Rau Đai, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Lemon Grass Chicken Stir-Fry

This is a common dish for weeknight supper, served with rice and a vegetable side or soup.  For this version, I’ve used boneless chicken breast.  The traditional version would be made with bite-sized portions of chicken with bone – cleaver to whole chicken approach.  If you choose to go with whole chicken with skin on, you may omit the oil and increase the amount of fish sauce by a tablespoon.  Chicken with bone is the best but a little messy and dangerous if you don’t know who to use a cleaver!

Tip:  To save some chopping time, you can put the onion and roughly chopped lemongrass into a food process and give it a few pulses.  Also, I rinse the food- processing bowl with the ½ cup water and then add it to the frying pan.

Lemongrass Chicken (Ga Kho)

(Serves 4)

• 3 stalks lemongrass stalks, roughly chopped
• 1/2 onion, roughly chopped
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 2 boneless breast of chicken, sliced
• 1 tsp kosher salt
• ½ tsp crushed black pepper
• 1 tsp sugar
• 5 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 red chili pepper
• ½ cup water
• 1 sprig green onion, sliced

1.  Pulse lemon grass with a food processor for 1 minute.  Add to the food process the onion and pulse until onion is finely chopped.  Set aside.

2.  Heat oil in a frying pan on medium-high and add sliced chicken breasts.  Season chicken with salt, pepper, sugar and fish sauce.  Stir-fry chicken until no longer pink.

3.  Stir the lemon grass mixture and sliced red chili pepper into the pan.  Continue to stir-fry for another 3-5 minutes to release the lemon grass and onion flavor.

4.  Add water to the pan, cover with lid.  Lower the heat and let simmer for 15 minutes.

5.  Serve by garnishing with green onions. 

 

Lemon Grass Chicken Stir-Fry, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Mông Toi (malibar spinach)

As spring arrives, we get to enjoy some favorite vegetables!   Although I’ve already posted the recipe for the soup using malibar spinach or mông toi, I thought it would be good to show you what it looks like before it’s cooked.  Don’t know about most of you, but I usually confuse this with rau đai.  Both canh (soup) mông toi and canh rau đai can be made the same way but definitely very different texture and consistency.  Canh Rau đai has a slimy broth.  Canh mông toi is more akin to spinach in taste although the soup is a little slimy kind of like what you see when cooking okra.  The leaves of mông toi is about twice as thick as spinach and the stems are a bit thicker.

As for rau đai, you’ll have to come back later to see what that looks like…once I see it at the local Asian market.

Below is the link to the recipe for the canh mông toi…

http://simplyvietnamese.wordpress.com/2008/04/

Mong Toi, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Healthy Fried Rice

How do you enjoy fried rice guilt-free?   Use brown rice instead of white rice and add lots of veggies.  Here, I’ve used less meat and added mushrooms.  As always with fried rice, remember to use cold rice.  I usually make extra rice for dinner so there is always left-over rice in the refrigerator for fried rice! 

Tip:  You can skip the chicken and make vegetarian fried-rice.  Feel free to substitute with left-over tofu or  meats such as chicken, turkey, beef or pork.

Healthy Fried Rice

(Serves 4)

• 2 tbsp of oil
• 1 boneless chicken breast or thigh (defatted and diced)
• ¼ cup of chopped onion or shallots
• 1 cup of finely chopped carrots
• 3 cloves of smashed or chopped garlic
• ½ cup sliced mushrooms
• 6 cups of cold, cooked brown rice
• 1 egg  
• 3 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tbsp oyster sauce
• 1/2 cup of frozen peas
• 1 sprig chopped green onions (optional)
• crushed black pepper to taste

 

1.  Heat oil in a large 12 inch skillet over medium-high heat.  Stir-fry chicken until cooked and lightly brown.  Add chopped carrots and stir-fry for 1-2 minutes.

2.  Add chopped onions/shallots and give it a quick stir until softened.  Next, add chopped garlic and sliced mushrooms.

3.  Cold rice tends to form clumps so use your hands to squeeze the clumps to separate the rice.  Add the cold, cooked rice to the fry pan and frequently turn the rice with a spatula for about 3-5 minutes.

4.  Create a hole in the middle of the pan by pushing the rice mixture to the sides of the pan.  Crack and egg in the hole and with the spatula give it a quick stir until the egg is scrambled.  Now incorporate the scrambled egg into the rice mixture.

5.  Once the rice seems to have softened and is emitting steam, add oyster sauce, fish sauce.  Stir-fry for about 1-2 minute over medium heat to integrate the seasoning with the fried rice.  Stir in the frozen peas and chopped green onions at the very end.  Add crushed pepper according to taste.

 

Healthy Fried Rice, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Fish in a Clay Pot / Cá Kho

This is a fish dish commonly known as caramelized fish or fish in a clay pot.  In Vietnames, it’s ‘cá kho’.   Just as there is many different ways to fry a fish, there are also many different ways to make ‘cá kho’. Almost any fish can be made this way – my tip is to choose fish that is more on the meaty side (catfish, halibut, salmon).  Since we are striving for simplicity on this blog, we will go the simple route of making ‘cá kho’.  The word ‘kho’ refers to a slow simmering cooking process, so allow at least 1.5 hours. (‘Cá’ means fish.)

Don’t be put off if you don’t have a clay pot.  A clay pot would be nice since you can serve the fish straight from the pot.  However, a large sauté pan with a lid will do just fine.

As with most dishes, ‘cá kho’ is served with a piping hot bowl of rice.  Note that this dish tends to be on the salty side so to be sure to balance it with some vegetables like bok choy.

Fish in a Clay Pot / Cá Kho

(Serves 6)

• ¼ cup sugar
• 6 tbsp fish sauce
• 2 lbs catfish fillets
• 2 tomatoes cut into wedges (optional)
• 3 sprigs of chopped green onion
• crushed black pepper

1.  Mix sugar and 4 tbsp of fish sauce together to make a marinade for the fish. 

2.  Place the fish fillets into a shallow baking dish and coat the fish with the marinade on both sides.  Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes to an hour.

3.  Place the fillets into a large sauté pan or clay pot (~6 quart) on medium high heat. Top with tomato wedges, 2/3 of the chopped green onions, and generous amount of crushed black pepper.  Drizzle the remaining 2 tbsp of fish sauce over the fish mixture. 

4.  Once the pan comes to a boil, reduce heat to a very slow simmer (~1 hour).  The liquid from the fish and tomatoes should reduce into thick, dark, caramel color sauce. Careful not cook the fish dry or else the bottom of the pan will char.

5.  Garnish with remaining chopped green onions and serve. 

Fish in a Clay Pot / Cá Kho, originally uploaded by simpleviet.

 

Winter Soup

This is my version of a hearty, winter soup, Vietnamese style! Great by itself or with some white/ brown rice. I prefer to start with a whole chicken to make the stock but you can opt to use the boxed or canned chicken stock.

To make the stock, bring a large pot of water to boil, add salt and the whole chicken and lower the heat to medium-low for a slow simmer for 1.5 hrs. Remove chicken from stock and let it cool on a large plate. Check that the chicken is done by poking a fork/chopstick into the side of the chicken to make sure that the juice is clear and not pink or red. Once chicken is cooled, shred chicken into thin strips. Note, you will have leftover chicken. Before using the chicken stock, skim off the top with a laddle remove scum and grease.

Winter Soup

(Serves 6)

• 8 cups of chicken stock (homemade or purchased)
• ½ cup chopped onion
• 3 carrots, sliced
• 1 lb Yukon gold potatoes, roughly chopped
• 2 leeks, cleaned and roughly chopped (optional)
• ½ head of cabbage, roughly chopped
• 2 cups of chopped or shredded cooked chicken
• 5 tbsp fish sauce
• black pepper to taste
• 1 sprig of chopped green onion for garnish

1. Bring chicken stock to boil and add onions, carrots and potatoes.

2. Season the soup with fish sauce and black pepper. Lower heat to medium-low and cook until carrots and potatoes are cooked, about 45 minutes.

3. Add to the soup, the chopped or shredded chicken, the leeks and the cabbage. Bring soup to a simmer for 10-15minutes until the cabbage is soft and bright green.

4. Garnish soup with chopped green onions to serve.

Winter Soup, originally uploaded by simpleviet.