Very likely the Best Bahn Mi on Earth!
Non stop from 2:30 - 11:00 PM
The line never ends
$1.50 each
Spicy/No Spicy are the only options
at
Banh Mi Huynh Hoa
Banh Mi Huynh Hoa
Saigon, Vietnam
Thursday, March 16, 2017
Wednesday, March 15, 2017
Phan Thiet - Deep Dive into Fish Sauce - Part 1
Phan Thiet
Car service Saigon to Phan Thiet takes about 4 ½ hours, it can
be a nondescript and boring ride, or it can tell a story.
The landscape itself is old,
a flat, arid plain, interspersed with a few muddy rivers feeding the occasional
fruit orchard or rubber tree grove. Single standing hills with rounded, conical
tops reminding that the volcanic Indonesian “Ring of Fire” is not far away, and
a coastal mountain range, separating the plain from the sea, allows a mild
breeze to slip through its low points, keeping the otherwise dusty air from
stifling. But the landscape is also littered. Littered with the refuse of
humanity. Abandoned store fronts and
businesses side by side with busy ones, all shabbily adorned with the kind of
litter we don’t see in the US anymore, but, if not for the environmental movement,
EPA regulation, and local anti-littering campaigns from the 1970s, we would.
It’s tempting to rant about the lack of environmental respect in the US, or
take the opposite view, and preach how over regulation slows business without
tangible benefit to the land or the health of those on it, but a 4-hour drive
across the southern plain of Vietnam illustrates the benefit of environmental
policy and refutes the idea that good environment and successful business are
mutually exclusive goals. Abandoned or busy, the businesses here all share a
common grime.
Entering Phan Thiet, crossing several canals, the smell and
feel of the sea abruptly replaces the brown plains. Hundreds of bright blue
boats line the canals, moored and waiting for the business of night fishing –
when the schools of small anchovies and sardines, attracted by lantern light on
the boats, are most easily caught. (The
boats, we’re told, are painted blue in order to match the sea and camouflage them
from the fish).
The beach front of Phan Thiet is in the midst of transition
from a culture based upon fish and coconut to the more lucrative tourism industry – both foreign and domestic. The build up of Phan Thiet, unlike some of the
already over built beach towns further north, is being planned to keep
the contour of the land and view to the sea more accessible and “eco-friendly”; the market driving environmental awareness?
We arrive at the hotel to meet our guide “Vu”, a local
restaurant owner who speaks enough English and Russian to act as tour guide and
ambassador. We’ve hired him for the weekend for his ability to translate and gain
us access to local fish sauce makers – many of whom avoid outside visitors out
of protectiveness of proprietary “secrets”, and in the wake of a recent scandal
involving one unscrupulous producer being exposed in the media for using non-traditional,
potentially toxic additives to speed up and increase yield in their production.
Before beginning our immersion into nuoc mam, Vu insists on our taking Lunch with a View at an open-air
restaurant, overlooking the ocean and catering to Russian tourists. Vu steers
us toward the fresh, local seafood, but the menu is printed in Vietnamese and Russian,
a lot of it thick with Russian comfort food.
At Vu’s recommendation, we order the local fried chopped
squid cakes and a salad of fresh, raw white anchovy filets, both served with
table salad and sesame rice papers, and see a repeated trend from a previous
meal in Saigon- the new style and old style nuoc cham, served side by side.
Traditional nouc cham is made of nuoc mam (fish sauce),
water, lime juice, sugar, chilies, garlic, carrot, and daikon. The new style – increasingly popular among younger
consumers with more “western” taste”, is more like a thin Thai peanut sauce –
sweeter, with no pungency from fish sauce and no heat from chilies. I’m not a
fan of the “New Style” nuoc cham.
"New Style"- left / Traditional, on the right.
Raw white anchovy salad, pickled onion, chilies, and
peanuts
Sesame Rice Paper – no added tapioca – handmade.
Lunch concluded, we board the
mini bus and head out to what will become our primary source of information,
aroma, and flavor for the next two days: The Tuan Fish Sauce Facility;
producing nouc mam in the traditional manner for consumption within Vietnam.
Although wholesome and delicious, the traditional process will not meet health
and safety standards for export.
Using the traditional method of the central coast, detailed below, Tuan produces six grades of fish sauce under it's own label, and supplies other companies in bulk to bottle and label for subsidiary brands. The basics of nuoc mam require fresh, whole, un- eviscerated fish, preferably small anchovies and sardines, sea salt, and one year of fermentation. The difference in grade is largely determined by protein content, expressed as "degrees nitrogen" dissolved in the liquid. By international agreement, 10 grams (degrees) of nitrogen per liter of fish sauce is the accepted minimum to be sold as "Fish Sauce" or "Nuoc Mam", with the best containing as high as 40g/liter.
Concentrations of dissolved protein are traditionally derived through natural proteolytic fermentation using enzymes from the intestines of the fish (hence their not being eviscerated). The natural concentration may be diluted using water to produce a lower cost, lesser quality, end product.
The fish are harvested fresh each day, year round, so although the anchovy population has been dropping in recent years (from 15,000 tons in 2012 to 10,000 in 2015 - and almost doubling the cost), the processing continues as long as the fish are delivered.
Modern, industrial facilities in both Vietnam and Thailand are able to extract higher quantities of nouc mam with fewer fish, but they can't compare with the depth of flavor and aroma of properly fermented, undiluted, aged nuoc mam.
Using the traditional method of the central coast, detailed below, Tuan produces six grades of fish sauce under it's own label, and supplies other companies in bulk to bottle and label for subsidiary brands. The basics of nuoc mam require fresh, whole, un- eviscerated fish, preferably small anchovies and sardines, sea salt, and one year of fermentation. The difference in grade is largely determined by protein content, expressed as "degrees nitrogen" dissolved in the liquid. By international agreement, 10 grams (degrees) of nitrogen per liter of fish sauce is the accepted minimum to be sold as "Fish Sauce" or "Nuoc Mam", with the best containing as high as 40g/liter.
Concentrations of dissolved protein are traditionally derived through natural proteolytic fermentation using enzymes from the intestines of the fish (hence their not being eviscerated). The natural concentration may be diluted using water to produce a lower cost, lesser quality, end product.
The fish are harvested fresh each day, year round, so although the anchovy population has been dropping in recent years (from 15,000 tons in 2012 to 10,000 in 2015 - and almost doubling the cost), the processing continues as long as the fish are delivered.
Modern, industrial facilities in both Vietnam and Thailand are able to extract higher quantities of nouc mam with fewer fish, but they can't compare with the depth of flavor and aroma of properly fermented, undiluted, aged nuoc mam.
Check out this woman unloading 280kg of fish by hand...it's only a 90 second clip.
Bulk fermentation of 3 tons fish/1 ton salt is done in concrete vats.
To facilitate even fermentation in such large containers, the liquid is drained from the bottom of the upper vat into a lower one, and then pumped back over the top. This is done twice each day for a year.
and then pumped through a simple filter, before being pumped once again into barrels for shipping to the bottling facility.
In addition to producing their own line of nuoc mam, and bulk fermenting for others, the Tuan facility produces very small batches of mam nem (fermented fish paste) and mam tom (fermented shrimp paste). These extremely pungent cousins to fish sauce are made only for family and "special" customers.
The mam tam is even more aromatic, dark, and deeply pungent
Considered by many to be "too stinky"these funky ferments are essential to some traditional dishes, especially Bun Mam, thin rice noodles tossed with cooked pork and dressed with mam nem , chiles, herbs, and pineapple
 |
| Bun Mam |
At the end of our 24 hour total immersion in all things Funky East of Saigon, we stocked up on "research material" - Tuan's entire product line, plus some of their Family Only mam nem and mam tom
And, once more, encouraged Vu to lead us to a local lunch
 |
Next up - A few meals in Saigon before heading south...really south.
The Mekong Delta and Phu Quoc, and nuoc mam in a totally different light.
Thursday, March 9, 2017
Cooking a simple dinner for one...
Still slightly jet lagged, feeling tired and like cooking in, so I went out on the street, found some rice and vegetables and tossed together a quick dinner.
A cool facet of Vietnamese markets is that you can buy "kits" of fresh vegetables and herbs.
Each package comes with the correct combination of things to produce a balanced flavor for a soup or stir fry.
My kit came with a chunk of pineapple, a pouch of bean sprouts, okra, tomatoes, chiles, luc-bin stalk (a water flower with a celery like constancy), ngo gai (culantro/saw leaf herb), and rau om ( rice paddy herb). The whole packet cost me less than $1.00 US and made a stir fry to serve with rice, tofu, egg, and a splash of fish sauce.
Vegetable Kit
Other ingredients
Finished Bowl
A cool facet of Vietnamese markets is that you can buy "kits" of fresh vegetables and herbs.
Each package comes with the correct combination of things to produce a balanced flavor for a soup or stir fry.
My kit came with a chunk of pineapple, a pouch of bean sprouts, okra, tomatoes, chiles, luc-bin stalk (a water flower with a celery like constancy), ngo gai (culantro/saw leaf herb), and rau om ( rice paddy herb). The whole packet cost me less than $1.00 US and made a stir fry to serve with rice, tofu, egg, and a splash of fish sauce.
Vegetable Kit
Luc Bin (stalks are crisp and moist, like celery)
Rau Om (Tastes of cumin and coriander seed)
Wednesday, March 8, 2017
Welcome to The Fish Sauce Trail
Introduction to Focused Travel and Fish Sauce Discovery
I'm a CIA educated cook,
molded during the Age of Le Nouvelle Cuisine and California-Mediterranean movement of the 1980s and 90s, and matured by 20 years as an instructor at the CIA in
Hyde Park. I cook, I eat, I travel, I learn, I teach.
Why Travel?
Educational travel has been shown to provide
multiple, significant, positive outcomes.
In describing the long-term effects of a culinary “cooks tour” for CIA students which I led in 2005, Social Psychologist Dr. David Livert writes:
“Understanding
a cuisine requires an exploratory stance: consuming food in a variety of
settings, exploring food markets and interacting with sellers, and
understanding food preparation through interaction with other cooks. A cook’s
tour of Vietnam thus required participants to not only consume novel dishes and
ingredients, but to extensively interact with locals, despite any intergroup
anxiety arising from intercultural contact…. Still in the early phase of their career—the average age of
respondents during the retrospective interviews was 30—most have already
attained a noteworthy level of success. Travelers consider the trip a critical
event in their personal and professional development.”[1]
Why Fish Sauce? “Fish
sauce is the duct-tape of the kitchen” – my quote
For
years, I’ve been fascinated by the ability of fish sauce to enhance and enrich
flavor and mouth feel. Fish sauce, used judiciously, can fix almost any savory
preparation, elevating a dish from “ok” to “delicious”.
Although
generally considered to be a “high sodium” ingredient itself, using fish sauce
in place of salt helps reduce total sodium consumption while enhancing the perception
of flavor intensity.
The
findings of the current study also support previous research on the taste
effect of acid oligopeptide fraction in fish protein hydrolysate (Fujimaki and
others 1973), where the researchers reported that fish sauce added a remarkable
brothy flavor and pleasant aftertaste in foods. It was also confirmed by
subsequent research that fish sauce contains a high molecular weight fraction
which likely transforms the perception of primary taste intensity and flavor
profile of foods (Ueda and others 1997) [2]
What
is Fish Sauce?
Vietnamese – nouc mam Cambodian
- teuk trie
Thai – nam pla Lao
– padaek
Philippine – patis Korean
– Aekjeot
Chinese (pinyin) - yú lù Latin –
garum (later – liquamen)
Modern Italian
– colatura di alici Japanese
– gyosho (generic, w/several sub-types)
Essentially, fish sauce is made by combining whole, fresh, live
fish with sea salt. Good
quality fish sauce is typically made from a single variety (depending upon region) of small, oily fish from the anchovy or
mackerel family. It’s important that the fish are alive and containing their
viscera, with some formulas requiring added viscera, as enzymes
in the gut are responsible for dissolving the fish proteins to a liquid state,
while the salt (typically 15-25% by weight) act to inhibit dangerous bacteria
from spoiling the mixture[3].
After 3-18
months of fermentation (based upon local custom and taste), a clear amber
liquid is drawn from the fermenting vessels and bottled for sale. Clarity,
color, aroma, taste, and flavor are defining characteristics of quality fish
sauce. Additionally, superior grades may contain as much as 30-40 g nitrogen
per liter [4],
and are designated as such on the label with the notation “30°N”, “40°N”, etc.
As
displayed above, fish sauce crosses borders throughout all of East Asia and
into the Mediterranean. Regional differences may yield
results which vary widely in salinity, flavor, pungency, and texture, but for
the purposes of this research I’ll focus on the most familiar and approachable
style – clear running, amber colored, salty, umami.
As I
encounter different regional variations and brands in southern coastal
Vietnam, I will collect samples, use the tasting sheet displayed below, and conduct blind tastings with associates here in Vietnam and, if
packaging and transport will allow, subsequent tastings with colleagues and,
hopefully, students at the CIA campus in Hyde Park.
Additionally, this Blog will act
as an on-line journal which I'll update almost daily to comment on the
food, culture, and people I encounter. As technology allows and is available, I'll include photos and video to enhance the story. I hope you find it interesting and
become inspired to travel to live and to learn.
Full Disclosure: This trip, and the research associated with it, has been funded in part by Red Boat Fish Sauce, Phu Quoc, Vietnam and Milpitas, California http://redboatfishsauce.com/fish_sauce.html
Tasting Sheet For Vietnamese Fish Sauce 2017
#
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Brand (when identified)
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Color
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Clarity
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Aroma
|
Taste/Flavor
|
Body
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Finish
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Notes
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