What is the greater folly – putting your hand up to cook for your large extended family, or putting your hand up to cook an unfamiliar dish for said extended family? Easy. Both are equally challenging.
The number of family members I’ve volunteered to cook for? 30, give or take. The dish? – a savoury dish composed of chargrilled pork patties and pork belly served in a steaming hot broth. The dish harks from Hanoi, and unlike southern Vietnamese noodle soup dishes, what sets bún chả apart is that the noodles aren’t added into the broth.
To accompany the broth are mounds of rice vermicelli, pickles and an assortment of fragrant herbs: typically standard mint, Vietnamese mint and shiso (purple perilla), and Vietnamese lettuce known as xà lách (pronounced very much like salad). This is the dish that was catapulted into the ‘Food Hall of Fame’ in 2016 – after TV host invited US President Obama to try it at a restaurant called during the episode of his show, .
I recall looking around the communal table at my fellow diners in Hanoi and perching atop a plastic stool to see how I should approach the multiple bowls set up in front of me. With bún chả, should you try a -style noodle dunk-and-drag through the broth, or a moderate ladling of soup into the noodle bowl? To be honest, it’s been so long since I experienced bún chả in Vietnam – 10 years since I first, and have since, visited the motherland – that I cannot remember. But I have thought about that dish, and sought it out ever since.
Global interest in bún chả spiked when US President Barack Obama was introduced to the Hanoi specialty during Anthony Bourdain's TV program. Source: Anthony Bourdain
In my copy of by chef Jerry Mai, I spot the recipe. It’s very doable. So doable I tentatively offer to make it for our next family gathering. My mum is enthusiastic, so we talk logistics and agree that bún chả will be the main dish. It could be like travelling, but without the motion sickness of long-haul flights – something my mum is prone to and has kindly passed onto me. She calls my aunties to let them know food is sorted.
The day arrives and I’ve packed my car with large stainless-steel bowls filled with marinated pork, jars of pickles, and bags of herbs. At grandma’s, my youngest aunty has set up my grilling station while she gets on with the meticulous task of washing the greens. The smoky aroma of caramelised pork fills our makeshift dining room under the verandah, my sceptical uncles fall silent as they watch on. My mum and aunties are energised and call out for what to do next – the novelty of me being in charge of feeding the family acts as a slight reprieve to the usual hustle and bustle.
Jerry Mai has also tackled the dish in her cookbook. Source: Chris Middleton
For whatever reason, I forget about the generous mounds of noodles and greens set in the family-sharing style for the dish, instead opting for a two-bowl-per-person situation for serving the bún chả. This is when the figurative wheels begin to fall off.
The smoky aroma of caramelised pork fills our makeshift dining room under the verandah, my sceptical uncles fall silent as they watch on.
Sure enough, my grandma’s cupboards are ransacked and emptied of every bowl-like vessel, my aunties handing each hungry family member two bowls, one with noodles, the other with broth. The recipient is then left to ponder how to approach the dish.
I’m still in the corner trying to juggle keeping the patties warm and ladling over hot broth, but everything begins to cool too quickly.
A particularly boisterous uncle stares down at his full hands, and announces to all that this dish is "BÚN CHẢ OBAMA!", his voice booming across the table, and proceeds to dump the contents of one bowl into the other, grab a pair of chopsticks and walk out into the garden. I guess you can take the man out of South Vietnam, but you can't take South Vietnam out of the man – it’s a bún bowl, not bún bowls for him.
The bowl situation adds an unexpected level of stress to executing bún chả for 30 or so diners. Source: Diem Tran
I’m at a loss and look across to see my grandma taking her first bite. She compliments the dish. I exhale with relief, not realising I’d been holding my breath for so long. I explain to my cousins how I experienced this dish all those years ago in a little shop in Hanoi. It’s a success – everyone is fed and full, and I haven’t burned the outdoor kitchen down. My aunties start to unpack the extra side dishes and desserts they’d prepared, just in case. I guess you don’t get the privilege of feeding our family without having a couple of tricks up your sleeve.
Experience it yourself
Barack Obama enjoys a $6 dinner with Anthony Bourdain in Vietnam
