Bun Cha - Vietnamese Noodle Soup with Pork
photo by jslander 
If your not so lucky to have a Vietnamese restaurant in your neighborhood, your in luck! I’m giving you a simple recipe for Bun Cha. Bun = rice noodles, Cha = grilled pork. It doesn’t get any easier than this! The sauce is a little bit sweet, a little bit sour mix of garlic, fish sauce and sugar. You first fill a soup bowl with lettuce, mint, scallions, vermicelli noodles and some hot pepper fish sauce and top with your favorite condiments, usually sriracha sauce or crushed red peppers sauce. It’s also common to top the dish with one or two spring rolls!
Bun Cha
INGREDIENTS:
1 lb. boneless pork lion, cut into 1 inch chunks
9 oz. vermicelli rice noodles, cooked
1/2 cup carrots, julienned
1/2 cup daikon radish, julienned
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon red wine vinegar
5 scallions, thinly sliced
1 1/2 teaspoon fish sauce
6 romaine lettuce leaves, torn into bite-size pieces
1 cup fresh mint, roughly chopped
1 cup fresh cilantro, roughly chopped
1/3 cup peanuts, chopped finely
Nuoc Cham (Vietnamese Dipping Sauce)
INGREDIENTS:
3 large cloves garlic, minced
1 hot red chili, such as Serrano, thinly sliced
1 cup water
1/2 cup fish sauce
1/2 cup red-wine vinegar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
DIRECTIONS:
First make the dipping sauce. In a medium bowl add all of the ingredients for the dipping sauce and stir well to combine. Set aside for now.
In a large bowl, soak the rice vermicelli with warm water for 15 min.
While the vermicelli is soaking, bring 2 quarts of water and 1 tsp. kosher salt to a boil in a large saucepan over high heat. Drain the noodles in a colander and add them to the boiling water, stirring to gently separate the strands. When the water reaches a boil again (about 2-3 minutes), drain the noodles in a colander. Put the noodles on a plate or in a bowl and set aside to cool.
Set a colander in the sink, add the carrots and daikon, sprinkle with 1 teaspoon of sugar, the vinegar, and 1/4 teaspoon of kosher salt and mix well. Let the colander sit in the sink for about 10 minutes. Then squeeze the vegetables to remove most of the liquid. Add the vegetables to the bowl of dipping sauce.
In another bowl, add the scallions, the remaining 2 teaspoons sugar, the fish sauce, 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt, and 1/8 teaspoon pepper and mix well.
Grill the pork over a medium-heat outdoor grill (using a grill basket) or in an oiled grill pan until they’re well browned outside and cooked through (about 8 to 10 minutes).
Serve in bowls, dividing the lettuce, mint, cilantro and noodles equally in each. Top with grilled pork and sprinkle with chopped peanuts. Drizzle the dipping sauce equally over each bowl and serve with sriracha sauce on the side.
Share | 
Email updates
Subscribe
This looks great. I wonder how the pork would taste in the smoker?
Actually, smoked pork would be perfect as the authentic method used in Vietnam is grilling the pork outside over a smoky charcoal grill.