Banh Beo Hue

[lapageria]

Newbie poster to egullet (having escaped the ravages of rec.food.cooking--not like the good ol' days, to be sure).

I'm in search of a good recipe for banh beo (those incredibly delicious little steamed rice & tapioca flour morsels topped with dried shrimp, herbs, lentils/soybeans and meat). Have a relatively sound French recipe which seems reasonable (galettes de riz au porc et aux crevettes sechees--can't find my accent marks, alas), but would like anyone's personal family favorites, etc.

Seems the batter is steamed in a vessel/saucer (rather than on top of a stretched piece of fabric like banh cuon). Also I'm wondering about the tapioca flour (90% rice flour--is that glutinous or regular??/10% tapioca flour)

Thoughts, comments, advice?

Noel (not Vietnamese) in Napa

[Jason Perlow]

Welcome to the site. I don't have a good answer for this but perhaps Andrea Nguyen will.

[Andrea Nguyen]

Hi Noel,

Try the recipe in Mai Pham's cookbook "Pleasures of the Vietnamese Table" (Harper Collins 2001); she doesn't have Vietnamese names indexed in the back but the recipe is on page 105. It's not a pretty good recipe. What you're thinking of in terms of the stretched fabric steaming thing is banh cuon, steamed rice crepes that are filled with pork, mushroom and shrimp.

Banh beo are like little flying saucers of steamed rice flour. Adding tapioca starch (not flour, though it looks like flour) gives it a firmness, which is required to set it up in the saucer.

Use small, shallow porcelain dipping sauce bowls (the cheap ones) as your molds. Banh beo are a little time consuming to make so have some beverage and company with you. Also note that you don't have to make them tiny. Get the larger dipping sauce bowls and things can be sped up. Also, you can use make them central Vietnamese style using rice bowls. Keep them in the rice bowl for serving. For these shallow dishes, a good place to get them is Kamei kitchen store on Clement in San Francisco.

Finally, make the dipping sauce a wee bit on the sweet side.

Sorry, I don't have a personal recipe to give you at this time.

[Andrea Nguyen]

Noel,

Sorry for the typo in the first graph. I'm tired from working on a writing project. I meant to say that it's a pretty good recipe that Mai Pham has, not

It's not a pretty good recipe.

I need some sleep!

A.

[lapageria]

Andrea:

Thanks so much for the reply! As a matter of fact I have quite of few of those little sauce "cups" from a S.E. Asian dinner I did for a friend a few years back, and they'll work perfectly.

I'll also grab (another) copy of Pham's cookbook. I had it once but it was "borrowed" and never returned. I was a bit disappointed in her first Viet/Thai combo book (I'm a bit conservative when I cook for some reason and like things "traditional." Ridiculous, I know!) but remember enjoying the more "authentic" recipes in the second book.

Great recommendation and thanks again.

Noel in Napa (who works in SF and misses the banh beo restaurant there which closed--right on the corner on Larkin. Do you remember it?)

[tissue]

These are delicious. I've had them with a coconut milky topping and without.

[lapageria]

Tissue:

Are you talking about the Thai rice cakes, kanom krok? I've never had banh beo with coconut, but they are very similar to kanom krok (although kanom krok is cooked in a pan over heat which is sort of like an apelskiver pan).

Just curious.

Noel (?)

[pieman]

This recipe might help you. Steamed buns with pork filling

pieman

noodlepie

[ecr]

I think Tissue is talking about khanom kuap .... jellyish rice flour bottom topped with thick coconut cream, steamed in small shallow saucers.

Khanom krok are the crispy-bottomed, coconut cream-filled Thai sweets cooked in a metal pan with indentations.

Perhaps while you're at it you'll want to try some other banh as well ... I'm particularly enamored of the translucent folded banh with a whole shrimp inside (maybe Andrea can supply the name?). Great texture, what with the crunchy shrimp shell and all.

[lapageria]

YUUUUM! You are all driving me into a feeding frenzy. Sent the SO off to Copia (our rather over-the-top Temple to Food & Wine here in the Napa Valley--I'm still not sure what it's all about, but I'm trying to be a good Napkin and support the local institution....) to pick up Mai Pham's book ("Plesures of the Vietnamese Table)as recommended by Andrea.

And, lo and behold, there was the recipe for banb beo, just as she'd promised. The cookbook is excellent, a big improvement over the first (or, rather, more focused on just Vietnamese food). Very interesting tips and trick. Can't imagine how I lost my first copy. Thanks, Andrea!

Having read the recipe, I have this half-baked (steamed) plot hatching in the back of my fertile flea-brain to do a multi-culti two-step using my idli maker and the little white porcelain sauce cups (which should fit perfectly into the idli maker depressions). So I can steam up a storm without having to go out and buy yet another kitchen implement. Good thinking, wot!?! I also have a South Indian apelskiver-esq cast iron number which I might press into service to make some of the Thai thingies (khamoms). Then I'm going to go on a huge diet.... I remember when I went on an idli/appam/hopper binge a few years back and gained 10 pounds as a result!!!! Arrgh.

So I'm a very happy camper.

Thanks, too, to everyone for their input. Now I just have to shift my lazy francis and get into the kitchen and start cooking. No nibbles on my nep chien question posted elsewhere, but I'm just going to forge/forage on ahead and see what I can do with turkey meat, fish sauce, and some glutinous rice.

What a lucky whosit I am to have received all of this kind assistance!

Thanks to everyone. I'll keep you posted as to my success (or, perhaps, failure!)

Noel (Contented in Napa)

[tissue]

I think Tissue is talking about khanom kuap .... jellyish rice flour bottom topped with thick coconut cream, steamed in small shallow saucers.

Khanom krok are the crispy-bottomed, coconut cream-filled Thai sweets cooked in a metal pan with indentations.

Perhaps while you're at it you'll want to try some other banh as well ... I'm particularly enamored of the translucent folded banh with a whole shrimp inside (maybe Andrea can supply the name?). Great texture, what with the crunchy shrimp shell and all.

I had this dish at a Vietnamese restaurant, not Thai, and it wasn't sweet. It was more of an appetizer.

[lapageria]

Well, I took a two-part stab at the banh beo using Mai Pham's recipe (rice flour) and also free-styling a bit by using soaked jasmine and glutinous rice, grinding it (a la dosa batter) and then steaming. Both results were awful, due entirely to my lack of understanding of the concept. By far too tough, thick and chewy. I was close, but the whole point of banh beo is the "silky" or slippery quality of the banh.

I verified this on Tuesday in the Tenderloin when I stopped by a restaurant specializing in Hue food, had a plate of banh beo, and pondered my failings.

As I walked back to catch my bus, I popped into a few Vietnamese grocery stores and, of course, there was the pre-packaged banh beo mix (with directions, no less, in four languages--albeit contradicatory in each language, but what the heck!)

I purchased two different brands, one with rice flour and potato starch only, one with those two and corn starch.

Today I mixed up the bag with the three "flours" following the English language directions and realized immediately that my error with the first batch was that my batter was far too thick. You end up adding 5 cups of water to 12 oz. of flour and the batter is about the consitency of milk. No thicker than that. So I whipped up a few dozen, garnished them with dried shrimp, cooked shrimp, fried green onions, yellow split mung, scallion oil, fried shallots and some pickled shredded carrots and dipping sauce. Perfection! My SO thought they were gross (the banh were too slimey for him) but they were pretty much spot on. His 81 year old mom from South Georgia thought they were great!

So the long and the short of it seems to be buy the package and follow the instructions, dufous. I always tend to make a huge and unnecessary production out of things, but I did learn a thing or two.

For my next go 'round I'm going to soak, slightly ferment, and grind some raw rice (just as Mai Pham describes) and really thin the devil out of the batter with water. I'm an old hand at idlis, dosas, appams, and hoppers, so I know the rice fermenting "technology" failure well. My idli maker was indeed useful, and I was able to score a dozen white porcelain saucers from AW Pottery in Berkeley which fit the depressions in the the three-tiered steamer perfectly. So I can do 12 at a time.

Thanks again to all for your feed back. I'm sure I've gained 5 pounds from eating my experiments, but that's what cooking is all about.

Almost as much fun as mastering kueh pie tee shells!

Noel (Fatter) in Napa

[Andrea Nguyen]

Noel,

That's a shame that the Mai Pham recipe failed you. She's suppose to be fairly reliable.

Dishes like banh beo are often left to the master vendors of Vietnam who've developed their trade secrets. From Pham's recipe, it seemed as if she'd deciphered some tricks of the trade.

If it's any consolation, there's a lot of really bad banh beo out there being sold at Viet delis where the shrimp has been turned a hideous day-glo orange by food coloring. The pancakes themselves may be as hard as tiny frisbees. So if you're determined, keep trying.

Andrea

[lapageria]

Alas, Andrea, the fault was entirely my own, not Mai Pham's.

I went a bit too far off the book, as they say. I think if I'd been more attentive, and not such a Noel-It-All, things might have come out better.

I am particularly enjoying the cookbook (thank you again for referring me to it). I made the cilantro/prawn with cellophane noodles and it was just delicious.

And, by the way, I'm really enjoyed your article in an old Saveur I had at home about going home to have your mom fix a dinner for friends. I'd never made the connection before, and lo and behold, there you were! Great story and recipes!

I will be on the look out for Banh Beo from Hell. They sound quite daunting!

Noel

[kai-chan]

Hi!

I'm trying to decide whether to make banh beo or banh xeo this weekend.

About the banh beo, should I try adding tapioca starch to Mai Pham recipe or it cool on its own?? If yes, how much? What variations of toppings are consider good?

I heard that beer makes banh xeo crisper but could leave a bitter aftertaste. Should I then just use carbonated water??? I remember having it with shredded jicama once. Is that a typical filling?? Should I add the yellow mung beans to the batter or is it better w/o. And I've seen several recipes including mushrooms. Does it taste better with them. If yes, what kind? Straw or button or any other kind you recommend. I haven't made this in years.

kai-chan

[lapageria]

<<About the banh beo, should I try adding tapioca starch to Mai Pham recipe or it cool on its own?? If yes, how much? What variations of toppings are consider good?>>

My failure with Mai Pham's "as-written" recipe was based completely on not following the recipe (it's a guy thing, I guess), which is no reflection on recipe.

I don't think it would cause any harm to add tapioca starch (as Andrea writes above, I believe it aids in thickening up the batter). As I wrote above (somewhere), both of the prepackaged banh beo mixes I bought has some sort of starch (potato or tapioca or both). I think this is more of a fool-proofer than a necessity as in Mai Pham's excellently written account of a master banh beo maker, no starch is mentioned. I know that other rice batter-based dishes firm up quite nicely (idlis, dosas, other types of banh), but I think the starch adds an additional layer of safety. I'd make up the batter without, try a few and see how it goes.

My one observation, though, is to avoid the temptation to make the batter too thick. When I used the packaged mix (and followed the instructions for a change), I was quite surprised as to how thin the batter was. Almost like milk (cow's milk, not coconut). You definitely need to stir the mix between batches as the rice flour settles something fierce. If I were to redo my banh beo with soaked and ground rice, I would make the batter much, much thinner than my first try. I was thinking idlis and it got me into trouble.

<<I heard that beer makes banh xeo crisper but could leave a bitter aftertaste. Should I then just use carbonated water???>>

I've heard of soaking rice papers in beer for cha gio (and also heard of objections to this), but haven't seen it listed in a banh xeo recipe. A bit of sugar, yes; beer, no. I'm sure the sugar aids in browning.

By a strange coincidence, I'm also on a parallel banh beo/banh xeo jag. I think the crispness will come from the oil, not the type of water.

<<I remember having it with shredded jicama once. Is that a typical filling??>>

My grocer was out of bean sprouts the other day, so I intuitively punted with jicama. Excellent result. I was obviously channeling a Vietnamese cook!

<<Should I add the yellow mung beans to the batter or is it better w/o.>>

Never tried adding them, but I've read of them as a filling, not an additive to the batter, although this is a bit of a moot point as the traditional method seems to be be to leave the partially cooked filling in the pan, and then add the batter to it (rather than the crepe or method, where you pour in the batter, let it set up, and then add the filling). When you douse the filling with the batter, it embeds some of the filling in the banh itself rather than having all the ingredients roll around on the "surface." My first few banh xeo failed because I used too much batter. Go easy or you get something cakey rather than crepey.

<<And I've seen several recipes including mushrooms. Does it taste better with them. If yes, what kind? Straw or button or any other kind you recommend.>>

I think that's a matter of taste. I'd pre-cook the mushrooms a bit so they don't weep too much though (if you like your mushrooms cooked).

Although they're called crepes or pancakes, I think conceptually banh xeo is closer to an egg-less filled omelette in which the filling is precooked and "lodged" in the egg matrix.

kai-chan

[Andrea Nguyen]

add tapioca starch (as Andrea writes above, I believe it aids in thickening up the batter). As I wrote above (somewhere), both of the prepackaged banh beo mixes I bought has some sort of starch (potato or tapioca or both). I think this is more of a fool-proofer than a necessity as in Mai Pham's excellently written account of a master banh beo maker, no starch is mentioned.

Part of the thing with banh beo is making the batter go up the side of the little saucers. I'm not 100% sure if grinding your own rice will do the trick. Rice flour is essentially soaked ground rice that's been left to sit out to dry. The fool proof method of adding a little starch to bind the batter really helps. That's why people buy the packaged mix. There's no guessing needed.

And, by the way, I'm really enjoyed your article in an old Saveur I had at home about going home to have your mom fix a dinner for friends. I'd never made the connection before, and lo and behold, there you were! Great story and recipes!

Thank you. I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed that article. It was a nice piece. I'm working on a Viet cookbook right now that's sort of along the same lines. That explains why I'm lamely chimming in late nowadays! Thanks in advance for your patience.

Andrea

[NhumiSD]

Part of the thing with banh beo is making the batter go up the side of the little saucers. I'm not 100% sure if grinding your own rice will do the trick. Rice flour is essentially soaked ground rice that's been left to sit out to dry. The fool proof method of adding a little starch to bind the batter really helps. That's why people buy the packaged mix. There's no guessing needed.

Thank you. I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed that article. It was a nice piece. I'm working on a Viet cookbook right now that's sort of along the same lines. That explains why I'm lamely chimming in late nowadays! Thanks in advance for your patience.

Andrea

←

The way to make the sides of the banh beo go up is to make sure your steamer is on high. have alot of water boiling under when you are steaming.

Another trick is to use muffin pans, which can hasten the production of these banh beo. You can make like 12 at a time. I would use a big steamer ( chinese stores usually carry them ). If not, you can take a big wide pot, fill it with water and place a cup or small bowl into the water. Place the muffin pans inside. Oil the muffin pan slightly for the first few trials. Cover and steam on high for a few minutues, then ladle in your banh beo mixture into the muffin pans. It should cook fast. Ive even been able to place a few muffin pans on top of each other to crank out more.

Hope this helps.

-NhumiSD

[BonVivant]

so has anyone managed to make these? i ate them while backpacking around VN, and i just recently ate them again (twice) here at home. better in VN but still these 'cakes' are bland. the part i enjoy most is drinking the dipping sauce i much prefer "Banh Khot". now that's real nice.

[Andrea Nguyen]

When made well, banh beo are stupendous. I've made them successfully, and my recipe was recently published in Carolyn Jung's article in the San Jose Mercury News:

Banh beo article

A couple years ago, when this thread began, I didn't have recipe to point egulleteers to but now I do!

Happy cooking,

Andrea