Dish of the day: Banh Trang (Rice Paper) & (Crispy-Fried Rice noodle
pancakes)
Where it’s found: Vietnam (The Mekong Delta; many grocery stores
carry packaged ones)
Breaking it down: Rice is husked, then ground into rice flour and
mixed with water and often tapioca flour.
The mix is spread thin into large circular pancakes and steamed. They
are dried in the sun. The dried rice
paper sheets are shredded into noodles, which are then fried in oil, and topped
with scallions and other seasonings.
 |
| The shells/husks of the rice |
 |
| The rice husks are used for fuel for the fire to steam the rice pancake/paper mixture |
 |
| The rice paper only requires a short time to steam and take its form |
 |
| Carefully laying/rolling out the cooked rice paper to let it dry |
 |
| Banh trang (rice paper) drying in the sun |
 |
| Shredding the dried rice paper to make rice noodles |
What is particularly fascinating is how they try to use every
part of foods and materials, instead of wasting anything. For example, the shells of the rice, or
husks, are removed and then used as kindling to keep the fire going, which is
used for heat to steam the liquid rice “batter” to make rice paper. Waste not!
Once the rice paper is formed, the hot, slippery and wet circle is
lifted onto flat wooden or bamboo drying racks. They are moved into the sun to
speed the drying process. Once dry, the
banh trang (rice paper) can be collected for consumption to make wraps, or it
can be put through a noodle-making machine to shred them into thin rice noodles.
After having observed the whole process, we also saw how
they make a common fried snack food: Dry rice noodles that are fried in a pan
in oil until crispy and seasoned with spring onion and often other spices and
herbs. It’s a crunchy fried snack, no more healthy than fried potato chips!
No comments:
Post a Comment