October 28, 2012

• Familiarizing Foreign

  

  Everyone has their oasises and ideals.  However, sometimes it is important to share just what it is we’re refering to… to actualize  away the magic within words conjuring and homp…there it is.  a seedier strip mall hole in the wall joint that for whatever reason seems to change it’s name once or twice a tax season….and or ownership/management.  I am not Vietnamese and aside from what the difference between a spring roll and an eggroll are, I’m not really on the case what is happening for dinner.  This IS OKAY!  let’s Familerize the Foreign… to me.

   

  Vietnam is a country far far away in southeast Asia.  in my parents and grandparentls time it was  unsuccessfully colonized by the french and later due to political interests wwas attempted to be made a democracy or puppet of others… while it took years and I mean half my lifetime’s worth – the country unified as a communistic country which in a way fits as so is it’s big neighbor china.  Ethnically and Heritalogically speaking… here’s a DUH, the people are?  Vietnames.  Like all people they get hungry and want food.  so they must eat and wow…another duh… they don’t do it like others do!

   

  I don’t have time to decipher the whole of an encyclopedia article  or length and breadth of a culture’s cuisine- but I’m going to warn you- it looked like a whole lot of foreign to me  until I came across this other blog with a dish similarly named to what I had the other night but looked far far different.  this is not surprising as local ingredients vary and also  it isn’t unheard of that people say something is in a “style of” rather than an exacting match.

  I had a bun dish.

  no, I didn’t have a bowl of rump.  I had bun, not bread persay but bun  rice vermicelli.

  bun from what I read means noodles rice.. but that website as it’s only fair you read what I did.

  http://behindtheskillet.blogspot.com/2009/08/rice-vermicelli-with-grilled-shrimp-bun.html

  this above link is to behind the skillet for a dish

  

  rice vermicelli with grilled shrimp

  bún tôm nướng

  yes this is a simplistic google powered translation of english from vietnamese of bun – rice noodle; tom shrimp; and nuong grilled.  now I mentioned that the vietnamese had themselves a boot out the foreigners couple of shoot ‘em up parties but the french like the americans leave inroads and borrowed words and in the case of the bun tom nuong which I can not pronounce correctly bun as i burger bun, tom as in tom cat and nu ong  hmn nwong – the sound of someone expressing their discontent of my butchering their native language with a pot upside my head.  but the point is the french did bring about the use of the more western style with a few additional characters required for complete duplication of the sounds of the language… thus sorry to disappoint but I can not give you some fancy charactered foreign for the dish I do not know enough to do so and it’s not actually correct anymore anyways.   but lets look at  other differences within the same.
  

  

   

   

  

  to me this same dish looks enirely different.  it’s not.
  

  the recipes however, can be.
  

  http://www.phamfatale.com/id_3060/title_Bun-Thit-Nuong-Recipe

  take out the pork/crab/steak no wheredoes thisdish give me the impresssion of fish sauce…. that doesnt JIVE with my mouth’s experience.
  

   

  sorry but not a speaker of vietnamese so long link
  

  http://recipes4viet.com/mon-nuong/bun-tom-nuong

  translate

  http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=vi&u=http://recipes4viet.com/mon-nuong/bun-tom-nuong&prev=/search%3Fq%3Db%25C3%25BAn%2Bt%25C3%25B4m%2Bn%25C6%25B0%25E1%25BB%259Bng%2Brecipe%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Doff%26client%3Dubuntu%26hs%3DUss%26channel%3Dfs%26prmd%3Dimvns&sa=X&ei=CW-NUN3bCaOWiAKspoHABg&ved=0CDUQ7gEwAg

  note how close but still foreign this is? pepper hash – HUNH????

  from cooks.com

  perhaps this is what they mean!

  1 med. cabbage
  2 green peppers
  1 tbsp. celery seed
  1 1/2 c. sugar
  1 1/2 c. water
  3 red peppers
  1 tbsp. salt
  2 tbsp. mustard1 seed
  1 1/2 c. vinegar

  —
  

   

   

   

  thats as close as are veggies here and  what the hell this stuff is.  yes – thus this is not just in the style of, but also americanized. deal with it.

   

  a good recipe close to what I got:

  http://behindtheskillet.blogspot.com/2009/08/rice-vermicelli-with-grilled-shrimp-bun.html

  again

  bun tom nuong

   

  

  basil or thai basil ifavail.

  

  cilantro (chinese parsley, the seeds are coriander)

  

  bean sprouts

  

  red pepper (watch it.)

  

  crispy fried onion

  sub toasted dried onion

  

  -

  

  cucumber

  

  rice vermicelli

  

  tiger shrimp if you can

  –

  missing is? the fish sauce so – a light one (wicked salt watch it)

  

  -

  recipe?

  http://behindtheskillet.blogspot.com/2009/08/rice-vermicelli-with-grilled-shrimp-bun.html

   

  The point is, that a lil bit of research can make something  very much findable  with stuff typicallyfor the most part recognized easy to understand… do try to follow as you find them your joys with those who know a different world than yours.  for my part I may makethis dish as I like it and can figure out the simplest version I can manage.  this dish with an electric kettle pot collender  knife or food processor  is fairly easy as you can drain the noodle and cook the marinated  shrimp. voila less dishes and the kettle brings up water faster than a stove top so you could be eating in literally less than thirty minutes.  do investigate what style means.  it can be close while you enjoy outtings to “authentic’ 

  

  oh and hin tgot sambal oulek? add a pinch of sugar for siracha.  the label difference

  and?take away the noodles and add common lettuce? you’ve a shrimp salad -eat the noodles you noodle doodle! – wrap this up (chop some) in rice paper? spring rolllllllll!

  • 2:30 pm
  • 14 Comments