Breakfast: Banh cuon

When we were in Vietnam, we loved eating banh cuon for breakfast. The dish has several components: thin layers of rice noodle crepes (made like crepes, but ladled over a steamer rather than a skillet), fried shallots, cucumbers, carrots, bean sprouts, and pork sausauge (gio lua). The entire thing is finished off with lots of nuoc mam, or flavorful sauce made of lime, fish sauce, garlic, and chilies.

Today my mom made us each our own plates of banh cuon for breakfast with all the Asian food supplies I brought her from Hong Kong Market in Houston:


Instead of shallots, we had caramelized onion but otherwise the dish was very true to the versions we had in Vietnam. I love all the differing textures -the soft noodles, the charred onions, the crunch of the carrots and cucumber- and the intense flavors of the onions and the fish sauce. I have to say that the fresh rice noodle crepes we had in Vietnam were lighter and thinner but the store-bought version is good in a pinch.