A central Vietnamese roll platter starts here, with boiled pork wrapped in rice paper and dipped in tuong ban. What makes it good is thinly sliced boiled pork belly rolled with sour star fruit, green banana and pineapple. The difficulty is boiling the pork so the water stays clear and slicing it very thin.
The pork is blanched for 2 minutes, rinsed in cold water, then boiled for 15 to 20 minutes with bruised ginger and shallot. The dipping sauce is blended from the pineapple trimmings, tuong ban and roasted peanuts, so it is nutty and fragrant at once.
This batch weighs about 2kg, at roughly 202 calories per 100g.
Method
Rub 1 tablespoon coarse salt thoroughly into the pork belly, scrub the skin with 1/2 lime until it is pale and clean, scrape the skin again, then rinse it several times in cold water.
Bring a pot of water to a boil, blanch the pork for about 2 minutes, then lift it into a basin of cold water and rinse it.
Set another pot of water on with the bruised ginger and shallot, 1 teaspoon seasoning salt and 1 teaspoon seasoning powder, and boil the pork for 15 to 20 minutes. It is done when a skewer goes in easily and no red juice runs out. Lift it out and let it cool completely.
Halve the pineapple, slice it thinly and cut it into batons, keeping the trimmings for the dipping sauce. Trim the ridges from the star fruit and slice it thinly. Peel the green bananas, slice them and drop them straight into a bowl of water mixed with 1 tablespoon vinegar so they do not darken. Wash the herbs and drain them.
Make the dipping sauce: blend the pineapple trimmings with 60ml tuong ban, 30g golden roasted peanuts and 1 tablespoon kOBE Monk Fruit Blend until smooth, pour it into a bowl and add a few slices of fresh chili.
Slice the pork against the grain as thinly as possible and arrange it on a tray with the herbs, pineapple, star fruit, green banana and rice paper, then roll and eat with the dipping sauce.
Tips
Cleaning the skin thoroughly before boiling is what keeps the cooking water clear and the pork sweet.
The pork has to be completely cool before slicing, and the thinner the slices the softer the roll.
Slice against the grain so the pork is not chewy in the roll.
Drop the green banana into the vinegar water as it is sliced, since it darkens within moments in the air.
Tuong ban is thick and salty, so loosen it with blended pineapple, since plain water leaves the dipping bowl flat.
Need kOBE Monk Fruit Blend?
The recipe above is sweetened with kOBE Monk Fruit Blend, measured 1:1 like sugar. See the product page or send us a message.