Vietnam – Bún Riêu

by Fauzan Anandika

For a coffee lover, Vietnamese coffee is one of the tastiest coffee in Asia. Serve using a manual brew machine known as Vietnam drip. Vietnamese coffee tastes sweet enough to enlighten your day. Vietnamese coffee uses a robusta mix with condensed milk to ease the bitterness. They use Robusta coffee as a base because it has less acidity and easy to mix with other flavors.

The dripping tools were used for the first time in 1957, during the war period. At that time, expresso coffee becomes too expensive for the Vietnamese because they don’t have enough money to buy it. In a crisis time like that, they build a manual brewing machine to process their coffee. They also use condensed milk to substitute sugar since their land can’t produce enough sugar for their people. Because of the climate problem, Vietnam can’t grow good quality sugar.

The Vietnamese loved drinking coffee, and now they have become the 2nd biggest coffee producer in the world. We can taste Vietnamese coffee almost everywhere in the world. They are also known for their high-quality product.

Despite their coffee, Vietnam also has a delicious dish and mostly is noodle. When visiting Ho Chi Minh, you will find a tasty noodle called Bun Rieu, a rice base noodle with tomato soup as a base crab. Cook with fresh vegetables and spice Bun Rieu usually serves as breakfast. As a tourist, you can order a different type of Bun Rieu, a crab topping (Bun Rieu Cua), fish topping (Bun Riue Ca), and a small oyster (Bun Rieu Oc). Pour with thick pork broth made from pork bone make a savory taste to Bun Rieu. Besides, Bun Rieu topped with sliced tomato, fried tofu, and pork blood.   

Vietnamese Pork and Crab Noodle Soup Recipe (Bún Riêu)

Serve 7-8 person

Pork broth

  • 2 kg gram of pork ribs bone
  • 5 liter of water
  • 1 teaspoon of salt

Tomato sauce and fried tofu

  • 5 big tomato, diced cut.
  • 10 ml of vegetable oil
  • 3 clove of garlic, minced
  • 3 shallot, minced
  • 2 pieces of fried tofu
  • 300 ml of tomato sauce
  • 150 ml of shrimp paste

Crab sauce ingredient

  • 200 gram of dried shrimp, soak with hot water, and drain.
  • 200-gram seasoned minced crab meat.
  • 15 ml of vegetable oil
  • 3 clove of garlic, minced
  • 3 shallot, minced
  • 4 piece of egg
  • 20 gram of salt
  • 5 gram of pepper powder
  • 15 gram of chicken or pork broth powder
  • 5 gram of MSG

Topping and filling

  • 400 gram of rice noodle, cooked
  • 200 gram of water spinach, finely sliced
  • 200 gram of lettuce, cut into a straw shape
  • 100 gram of bean sprouts
  • 3 pieces of lime. Sliced
  • 6 stalk of scallions, thinly sliced
  • Vietnamese herb (Perilla, Sorrel, Vietnamese Coriander, Mint, and Fish Mint)

How to cook

Pork broth preparation

  1. Wash clean the pork bone, 
  2. Prepare a big boiling pot, add water and salt. Boil it.
  3. Add pork bone and cook for 5 minutes.
  4. Drain and strain the pork bone.
  5. Clean the boiling pot.
  6. Add 5 liter of water. Add pork bone, boil for 55 minutes with a small fire.

Tomato sauce and fried tofu preparation

  1. Prepare a big boiling pot for the sauce. 
  2. Stir fry oil, garlic, and shallot with low heat. Fry until fragrant. 
  3. Add tomato and fried tofu, stir slowly and cook for 3-5 minutes.
  4. Cook the shrimp paste with 20 ml of broth, cook until melting, then add it to the saucepot.
  5. Add tomato sauce slowly while frying to make a red color. 
  6. Pour tomato sauce into the broth pot.

Crab sauce preparation

  1. Grind the dried shrimp with a food processor.
  2. Using the saucepot, heat the oil with a medium fire.
  3. Add garlic and shallot, fry until fragrant.
  4. Add seasoned crab, stir fry until fragrant.
  5. Turn off the fire and wait until completely cold. 
  6. Add dried shrimp, egg, salt, pepper, chicken broth powder, and MSG. Stir until mixed perfectly.
  7. Turn on the fire and boil the broth. Pour the crab sauce into the broth pot.
  8. Lower the heat and cook for 45 minutes.

How to serve

  1. Add noodle into a serving bowl.
  2. Pour the soup and pork.
  3. Garnish it with lime juice and scallions.
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