hey everyone welcome to Pai's kitchen now if you've been following the show you'll know that I've been
making dishes from several Asian countries I've done the Philippines Indonesia Japan and I've
been really wanting to do Vietnam so today I am going to make a Vietnamese banh mi sandwich which
is one of my all-time favorite Vietnamese dishes ever now in North America the bun mission which
is becoming increasingly popular and I can get it just about anywhere in Vancouver but every time I
get it from a store I'm always wishing you know there was more of this and less of that I know I
wish she didn't do this and so I thought you know what I'll just make it myself and make it exactly
how I want it and it's also really fun easy things to do in fact it's a great party idea to have like
a make your own banh mi sandwich idea brilliant so I'm super excited let's get started when it
comes to making a banh mi sandwich you can make it as hard or as easy on yourself as you want
depending on how many things you want to make from scratch right so today I'm going to make
two things from scratch and that is a carrot and daikon pickle which is essential in the sandwich
and the other one is a grilled lemongrass pork tenderloin which is my own recipe so let's start
with the pickle so I've got here some carrots and daikon that I've cut into tzer's batons sometimes
daikon can be quite bitter if you peel off the first layer you notice that it turns white but
if you keep going if you keep peeling it again and again and again you notice that the color
starts to darken and turn a little bit translucent instead of very paper white I find that when you
get to that place it's less bitter because the bitterness seems to be concentrated around the
outside so first what I'm going to do is sort of massage the liquid out of the carrot and daikon
I'm going to add some salt a little bit of sugar and the salt and sugar has this property that
draws liquid out of whatever food you put it on now massage the salt in the sugar until you no
longer feel any grittiness now you don't have to do this but it allows the pickle to be ready so
much faster so I'm going to stop and I'm going to let this it so while that's sitting let's
make the pickling liquid so I've got here's some water and to this I'm going to add equal
parts vinegar or maybe that was vinegar and this was water I'm not sure but doesn't matter so now
I'm going to add just a little bit of salt and some sugar now it's up to you whether you want
to make this a sweeter pickle and add more sugar now I'm going to stir this until it's completely
dissolved all right so that's done now let's take a look at the carrot and daikon oh it hasn't sit
very long but as you can see there's already quite a lot of liquid that comes out okay and
now I'm going to rinse this because this has got too much salt too much sugar right now so just
cold water now because we've gotten rid of some water inside the vegetables the vegetables will
absorb the pickling liquid a lot faster so next I'm going to make my grilled lemongrass pork now
you can put whatever kind of meat you want in your sandwich you don't have to do this recipe
but I just wanted to share this as a something that you can do if you don't have any other ideas
that it happens to be delicious so I'm going to go in first with some garlic and I just want to
show you a trick sometimes I just throw it in with all the skin and then I just smash it until they
break and then the skin comes off easily Evora so just pound that until it's sort of fine okay so
once are no more big chunks I'm going to add my white pepper and the white pepper will create a
bit of friction and it'll help the garlic become finer so once it's sort of a fine paste you can
add the lemongrass which I have chopped and pound that down into a paste mmm by the way this is the
bottom of the lemongrass only I don't use the top half really for cooking because there's not a lot
of flavor in there so once the lemongrass is all broken up like that I'm gonna go in with all my
seasonings so I've got some oyster sauce going in I've got some fish sauce see Vietnamese and
Thai people share the love of fish sauce yay fish sauce and I'm also going to add a little bit of
oil it'll help protect the pork when we grill it so it will dry out as easily some honey for some
sweetness and there's something about honey and pork on the barbecue just goes so well together
and then this is completely optional but if you want to get a nice dark color in there you can add
a little bit of black soy sauce or dark soy sauce just for color if you want you don't have to this
is five-spice powder and I have a video that shows you how you can make your own five-spice powder
but you can also just buy it it actually works quite well in this recipe but you don't have to
the hooks so good mmm mmm all right so here's my pork tenderloin that I have removed the silver
skin which is chewy and then I cut it in half horizontally so the marinade penetrates better
and also with cooks faster and I'm going to pour the marinade all over the pork and then just make
sure it's all well covered and you want to let this marinate for at least two hours so you can do
this a day in advance even better and whenever I marinade half way through I get a chance I always
Commons would flip things around to redistribute everything so you can either cook this outside
on the barbecue or what I do is I bro it in the oven on the top rack and to both sides are nice
and golden brown and even a little bit charred for that extra smokiness time to assemble the sandwich
now when it comes to fund me there are no rules about what must or must not go into the sandwich
I mean after all it's a sandwich so what I'm gonna make today is a classic version that's available
in pretty much every bunny restaurant in North America and by the way I'd love to know what you
like in your bun me especially if you're from Vietnam there's something different there we'd
love to know about it let me know in the comments okay so what I have here is some cucumber which
i think is really important some cilantro lots and lots of it one thing about cilantro this is
my biggest pet peeve when I get a bun me is when they put the whole sprig of cilantro in and then
you bite into it you pull in like a whole sprig of cilantro follows you out so I like to break it up
into smaller pieces so that you know I don't have that problem this is why I like to make it myself
this is the pork that I made earlier and as you notice the pork is a little bit pink in the middle
and that's how I like especially tenderloin is so lean if you do it completely well-done it can be
a bit dry this next one is a classic Vietnamese cold cut in Vietnamese I think it's called in
Thai we called mooyah we use it quite a lot too in Thailand and it comes usually wrapped in plastic
now sometimes it also comes wrapped in banana leaf but inside they're more or less the same and if
you don't want to make the pork the grilled pork you can just put this in as your only filling then
it's a lot easier for you right you don't have to make it all right spreads now when we're talking
about spreads my absolute favorite thing in upon me is pate so this is a pork pate which I prefer
but you can also do chicken liver pate which tends to be softer and has a milder flavor when it comes
to spicy most Vietnamese restaurants are going to offer you how to pin yo fresh jalapeno as
an option I actually prefer putting a little bit of sriracha because I feel the spiciness is more
evenly distributed and I'm a you know stickler for things being evenly distributed in a sandwich
all right the bread now most people are going to say use a baguette for a bunny sandwich which is
true however not all baguettes are good for bun me especially the european-style ones that have
a very thick crust which then is harder for you to bite through and then it scratches the roof
of your mouth which is my biggest pet peeve when it comes to sandwiches sandwiches should not hurt
so I suggest looking for bread that has a thin crisp crust and has a fluffy soft interior so the
dough doesn't overwhelm the filling and then you can easily bite through it right so what I do is
I actually buy this bread from your favorite buy me restaurant and it's perfect and you can cut it
up and freeze it and bring it out and heat it up when you're ready to use it okay so let's build it
now that smell is so iconic of upon me I love how it is exactly how I want it this is a great
thing about making your own cooking your own food in general that tarp carrot and daikon
pickle contrasts sort of the creaminess of the pate and heaviness of the meat cucumbers crunchy
and light and that bread this place has good friend oh my goodness so I hope you give this
a try as you can see it's so much fun to put together what a great way to have people over
and make their own sandwiches and the recipe will be on half Thai Kitchen calm and when
you make it send me a photo on Facebook Twitter or Instagram don't forget to subscribe if you
haven't done so so you never miss an episode and also don't forget to let me know what you like
in your bun me sandwich and I will see you next time for your next delicious adventure