One of the unexpected benefits of the California drought is the best lemongrass that I’ve ever grown. The hot temperatures this year, combined with our more frequent dousing of water saved from warming up the shower produced lush stalks. I’ve been making my dad’s lemongrass tea and looking for more reasons to employ the aromatic, which is leagues better fresh from the ground than from the supermarket produce section.
When Diane from Toronto emailed about a lemongrass pork sausage banh mi, I was game. Her message and photo:
I enjoy reading your blog over lunch at work. It's reading about delicious food while eating delicious food. 🙂
Your Banh Mi Selfie contest made me crave for the sandwich. So on our weekly trek to downtown Toronto to visit my mom, we went to Banh Mi Boys. I was disappointed though as the bread wasn't crunchy enough. Is this the traditional way? [No, that's just a banh mi shop not toasting/refreshing the bread before making customers a sandwich.]
Another trip to Toronto this past Sunday allowed me to buy the bread from a Vietnamese 'fast food' place in Chinatown. For a quiet Thanksgiving Monday, I made the Momofuku recipe for grilled lemongrass pork sausage and made pickled daikon and carrot as well. Toasted the bread to our desired crunchiness. Attached is the picture. My friends on facebook loved it. My husband and I enjoyed it. 🙂
Diane is a smartie because she the recipe she was using in David Chang’s Momofuku cookbook was essentially a Vietnamese lettuce wrap with a Korean name (saam). There was nuoc cham, lettuce and pickled daikon and carrot. Why not put it into bread? It was a natural.
Diane used a yoghurt garlic sauce with hers and I suggested to Diane that she make the dead simple yogurt sauce in The Banh Mi Handbook. (Diane subsequently went to her library to check out the book and had to be put on a waitlist; when she went to pick up the book it had been deemed ‘lost.’ Very sad 🙂
When I read the recipe in the Momofuku cookbook, I found it to be geared for restaurant usage. That is, Momofuku baked the pork mixture and then cut it into thick logs before a final grilling. That explained the shape of Diane’s pork sausage. A brilliant approach for a restaurant but a bit fussy for home cooks. I decided to omit the baking and opt to panfry the sausage as patties, which here were sliced for banh mi. (You could use the patties whole as banh mi sliders too.) That one process cooking cut down on time considerably. If you grill the sausages, use a handled grilling rack or basket for ease.
The pork mixture had a high amount of salt, which I’ve experienced while dining at Momofuku. I imagine that the baking removed some of the saltiness through the juices and fat that released, but I didn’t see the need for 1 tablespoon of kosher salt (1 ½ teaspoons regular salt) for 3 pounds of meat (I halved the amount of pork so that would be 1 ½ teaspoons kosher / ¾ teaspoon regular salt). Hence, I reduced the amount of salt. The Sriracha is there for depth but does not hit you over the head with heat. Very nice. I used the full amount.
Flour bound the mixture to prevent the loss of too much of the juice during cooking. I reduced the amount of flour since I wasn’t baking. To ensure even cooking, a flat versus domed patty and less shrinkage, I poked a hole in the center of each patty. I only used one lemongrass stalk for this recipe but I’m sure I’ll be making more. It makes a terrific banh mi sandwich. The photo at the top features the lemongrass pork patty with a homemade banh mi roll, sriracha aioli, Euro Maggi, daikon and carrot pickle, cayenne, Persian cucumber (a little too wimpy for my taste) and cilantro.
Thanks Diane.
If you’re unsure about using lemongrass, be sure to check the Lemongrass 101 article for tips.
Recipe
Lemongrass Pork Sausage Banh Mi
Yield: 12 patties enough for 6 sandwiches
Ingredients
- 1 medium lemongrass stalk, trimmed and coarsely chopped (¼ cup /25 g)
- ¼ cup (1.1 oz/ 30 g) roughly chopped shallot
- Rounded ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon fish sauce
- 1 tablespoon sriracha chile sauce
- 1 ½ pounds ground pork
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour or almond flour
- 1 to 2 tablespoons canola oil, for pan-frying
Method:
- Use a mini food processor to render the lemongrass, shallot, salt and sugar into a fine texture. Pause, as needed, to scrape down. Add the fish sauce and sriracha process to combine. Taste and adjust as needed for a salty, slightly spicy flavor. It will be more intense than you are comfortable with. Transfer to a bowl.
- Add the pork and flour and stir to combine well into a medium-soft mixture.With slightly wet hands, shape the pork into 12 patties, each about 3 inches (7.5 cm) wide and a good ½ inch thick. To ensure even cooking, poke a hole in the middle.
- Heat a medium or large skillet over medium or medium-high heat. Add 2 to 3 teaspoons oil. Pan-fry the patties in batches, as needed, for 3 to 4 minutes per side, until brown and cooked through. Knick with a knife tip to test.
- Transfer to a plate or rack and cool for about 10 minutes before slicing and using for sandwiches. It’s great with any of the pickles. Use with the sriracha aioli if you want a rich layer of heat, in addition to the fresh chile slices.
Adapted from: Momofuku by David Chang and Peter Meehan
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