Bánh Mì For Days On End...

Content.

Friday, 07 January 2011 19:45

So, I made a wee error yesterday. I made Bánh Mì for Jody. They are Vietnamese sandwiches, Saigon subs...whatever you call them, they are primarily inexpensive street food. Fabulous. Jody had never eaten them, but I have...mostly at Vinh Xuong Bakery and Ba Le, both on Federal in Denver. He really liked these sandwiches. We have had them for lunch and dinner yesterday and lunch and dinner today. We have tried several breads and several meats. All pretty damn good for Vietnamese street food. But tonight was the last time for awhile. I mean, how flippin' long can we eat these things?

I primarily used the recipe from ThreeManyCooks on Tasty Kitchen. I didn't use pork, because it's not Jody's favorite protein. Instead, we used chicken, shrimp, tofu and beef. And combinations of those three. I also doubled or tripled the sauce for the protein, and I used sambal oelek instead of sriracha. I also doubled the pickling for the vegetables as to make it easier to cover them, because I always use more veggies. I also used a beriner to slice and julienne these vegetables. I can't recommend one of these mandolines enough. They are inexpensive (~$20) and they really make slicing a snap. Just USE THE GUARD. I lopped off the end of my finger several years ago slicing onions for my French Onion Soup (recipe to come) and it was *the* most painful event of my life. I guess I've had a charmed life? I dunno, but it hurt like blue blazes.

So, I took pictures of the main assembling steps tonight. I used some cube steak I picked up on sale. I sliced it thinly crosswise against the grain and then Jody browned it in a titch of olive oil.