Banh xeo

So this isn't as much of a recipe as more of documenting my first attempt at a Vietnamese dish other than Pho. ( Which I'm totally obsessed with ) I will provide a list of ingredients that you can find at an Asian grocery store... but in the process of making these puppies, things got a bit wild - read - Blackberry liquor and Lychee cocktails!

 We picked up some sweets from Ranch 99 - who doesn't love Panda cookies and YanYan?


Banh Xeo was described as a sweet/savory Vietnamese crepe by my friend, Kevin Tran.

" A bit sweet, a bit crunchy, savory, with delicious shrimps and doused in homemade fish sauce... mmmm... makes me think of home!"

I was sold. Darnit, I HAD to have these crepes. So we ventured to Ranch 99 to pick up various supplies and necessities.

1) Banh Xeo Mix- adapted from a a recipe I found @KitchenChick

• 1 cup rice flour ( only Rice flour will give it that nice texture!)

• 1/2 tsp sugar ( I use brown sugar)

• 1/2 tsp salt

• 1/2 tsp turmeric ( I like to be generous with this - gives it the nice yellow color!)

• 2 cups canned coconut milk ( I prefer the Chokoh brand ) Make sure it's the creamy kind - not the water. 

• 1 medium egg, room temp

• 1/4 cup lime juice 

2) Soaked Mung Beans -

• Rinse mung beans thoroughly and put in a glass bowl
• Cover in an inch of water and then microwave for 30 seconds to 1 minute - Kevin said that they could be eaten softer or with a little crunch. I tried it both ways and preferred the texture that the crunchy ones added. It also gives a nice, sweet, earthy taste. 
• These are added after the batter is poured into the pan so they end up in the middle of the crepe. 

3) Shrimp / Pork / Beef

• The awesome thing about Banh Xeo is that you can pretty much put any meat in there. We chose shrimp, but thinly sliced pork or pre-cooked beef will work nicely. 

4) Homemade Fish Sauce- (Kind of) 

• Mrs. Tran, Kevin's mum recommended that we choose a stock sauce from the asian market and then add fresh ingredients.
• We added a bunch of fresh ginger, sugar, green onions, and vinegar to Nuc Mam ( Fish sauce ) stock from ranch 99. We have since perfected the recipe and I will be posting the whole thing soon! 

Prepping the Fish Sauce!

Here is the batter, prepared with onions and garlic added. Just mix all the ingredients listed above in a bowl until it looks to have a thin consistency. I used a ladle to spoon in to a hot non-stick pan. It's important to use a non stick pan for all crepes because they are thin and easy to break. You'll get better results adding the batter to a hot pan and then sliding the crepe onto a plate. There is some elasticity due to the rice flour and eggs.

As you can see- we tried putting batter into one of my all-clad pans - this was a terrible idea. The non-stick on the left was perfect and made a HUGE crepe. I liked that there was a bit of a curve to the non-stick pan because the crepe is substantial and my smaller crepe pan would have not have cradled the delicious toppings we put inside.

Here you can see we added chopped white and green onions, shrimp ( pre-cooked ), soaked mung beans, and whatever else you might want to put in there!

• Similar to French crepes, wait until the batter starts to bubble and gets opaque ( instead of transparent ). 

• Take a plastic spatula and loosen the sides- using a spatula and a big spoon, fold the crepe over on itself. 
• Turn up the heat so that you get a nice golden crust on both sides of the crepe. 
• Slide out of the pan and drench with fresh fish sauce 
• Sprinkle with green onions 

Enjoy!