Vietnamese
Bun Cha
Bun Cha is Vietnamese home cooking, eaten at lunch and dinner. On the plate it is the dish at the centre. Below is what usually sits beside it, what it does and does not contain, and what else to cook once you have made it.
Ingredients
- 1.5 lb ground pork
- 12 oz rice vermicelli
- 2 lemongrass stalks
- 3 shallots
- 4 garlic cloves
- 1/4 cup fish sauce
- 3 tbsp sugar
- 3 tbsp lime juice
- 1 carrot
- 1 cucumber
- 2 cups fresh herbs
- 1 head butter lettuce
How to cook it
- Mix the pork with the minced lemongrass, shallots, garlic, 2 tbsp fish sauce, and 1 tbsp sugar and form small flat patties.
- Whisk the remaining fish sauce, sugar, lime juice, and 3/4 cup warm water into a dipping sauce and stir in the shredded carrot.
- Soak the rice vermicelli in hot water until tender, then drain and cool.
- Grill or pan-sear the pork patties over high heat until charred and cooked through, about 4 minutes per side.
- Divide the noodles, grilled pork, sliced cucumber, herbs, and lettuce among bowls.
- Serve with the dipping sauce to spoon over everything.
Serve it with
A Vietnamese dinner is a plate rather than a single dish. These are the courses that normally sit beside Bun Cha, read from the same composition Dinejot builds a real meal from.
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Something to sip
Safe at your table
Dinejot tracks ten allergens and tags every one of them by hand, so the absences below are as deliberate as the presences. Bun Cha carries fish. It is free of the remaining 9 allergens on that list.
| Allergen | In this dish | Cook this instead |
|---|---|---|
| Peanuts | No | |
| Tree nuts | No | |
| Dairy | No | |
| Gluten | No | |
| Shellfish | No | |
| Eggs | No | |
| Soy | No | |
| Fish | Yes | Lemongrass Tofu Stir-Fry |
| Sesame | No | |
| Coconut | No |
These tags are set by a person rather than inferred from an ingredient list, and they describe the recipe as written here. Read the labels on whatever you actually buy.
What it brings to the plate
Bands, not numbers. Dinejot does not weigh anybody's food, so it says light, moderate or hearty and stops there. This dish was read and set by hand.
- Calorie band
- Moderate
- Protein
- High
- Protein quality
- Complete
- Food groups it covers
- Grains, Vegetables, and Meat or fish
- How this was set
- Hand audited
When to cook it
Bun Cha takes about 60 minutes from a cold stove to the table, and the cooking itself is a proper project. It is eaten at lunch and dinner. Nothing in the calendar rules it out, so it is a year round dish.
More to cook
Cooked from the same things
Other dishes built on pork, noodle, and herb.
From the same kitchens
More cooking from the United States.
Does the same job on the plate
Swap any of these in when you want a meal the same shape.
Cook this with your whole family
Dinejot plans breakfast, lunch and dinner as whole plates, built around the cooking you call home and filtered for the allergies at your table.
Meal suggestions support your goals. They are not medical advice. Please ask your doctor about your family's health needs.