How easy is it to make Vietnamese food? Incredibly easy. Most of what people try at Viet restaurants is multilayered specialty cooking -- mon qua (literally "gift food"), that have many components. The Vietnamese repertoire is full of simple and delicious recipes, too.
Take this chicken recipe, which was inspired by a trip I took to Phu Quoc island, a fish sauce producing hub off the coast of Vietnam. Friends at Red Boat fish sauce made it from a free-range chicken that they hacked up and marinated, then grilled over charcoal. Whole chicken in Vietnam is celebratory food and the dish was part of our beer guzzling outdoor eating feast.
The chicken was so delicious that knew that I wanted to include it in one of my books. That's why I developed a simplified version for my upcoming book, Vietnamese Food Any Day. It's on page 98 and called "Grilled Slashed Chicken" because slashing the chicken is akin to chopping it into small pieces and marinating. The seasonings penetrate faster to create extra deliciousness.
Christopher Kimball's Milk Street Kitchen magazine asked me to contribute a dead simple recipe to illustrate how cooks in Vietnam achieve big flavor fast. I immediately thought of the Grilled Slashed Chicken from the new book. They tested it and agreed.
When I was writing Vietnamese Food Any Day, I brought the slashed chicken recipe and ingredients to a friend's home. We cooked it up with their kids, who ranged from elementary to high school age. Everyone enjoyed gobbling it up.
So what are you waiting for? Check out and make the Grilled Slashed Chicken recipe that's over at Milk Street Kitchen site.
About Vietnamese Food Any Day
I'm aiming to get more folks to make Viet food part of their regular rotation with this book. It's my sixth cookbook baby and it releases on February 5, 2019. Here's a Vietnamese Food Any Day preview!
I hope you enjoy the book! Thanks in advance for your support!
