Vit Nau Chao (Duck and Taro in Fermented Bean Curd Broth), No Added Refined Sugar
Vietnamese dishesNoodle SoupsSouthern Vietnam2 hours marinating, about 50 minutes cooking
Duck and taro cooked in fermented bean curd gives a deep red pot, thick and heavy with the scent of chao, with tender duck and taro that dissolves in the mouth. Water spinach and bok choy dipped in, then everything spooned over rice vermicelli, makes a neat hotpot meal.
The hardest part is taking the smell off the duck and stopping the taro cooking down into porridge. Rubbing salt over the duck and rinsing it off is the fastest way with the smell. The taro is split in two, one part blended so the broth thickens, the other fried golden and dropped in at the last minute so the pieces stay whole.
This batch weighs about 5.9kg, at roughly 156 calories per 100g.
Method
Rub 1 tablespoon of salt all over a 1.5kg duck, rinse it thoroughly, chop it into small pieces and drain.
Peel 500g of taro, wash it and cut it into pieces about two finger joints long. Peel and chop 4 shallots, 5 cloves of garlic and 1 knob of ginger. Pick over 200g of water spinach and 200g of bok choy and cut them into lengths.
Put 200g of taro into a blender with 200ml of unsweetened oat milk and blend it very smooth.
Mix 300g of red chao with 2 tablespoons of the chao liquid, 3 tablespoons of kOBE Monk Fruit Blend, 2 tablespoons of annatto oil and 2 tablespoons of MSG and mash it smooth. Marinate the duck with the chao mixture along with half the shallot and half the minced garlic for 2 hours.
Set a pan with 5 tablespoons of cooking oil and fry the remaining taro over low heat for about 5 minutes until golden on both sides, then lift it out.
Put 2 tablespoons of cooking oil in a pot and fry the remaining shallot and garlic with 1 tablespoon of minced ginger until fragrant. Add the duck and cook over high heat for 10 minutes until firm, then add the blended taro mixture and cook another 10 minutes.
Pour in 2 litres of water, season with 3 tablespoons of kOBE Monk Fruit Blend and 4 tablespoons of seasoning powder, lower the heat, cover and cook for 30 minutes. Add the fried taro and wait for it to return to the boil.
Mix the dipping sauce: mash 50g of chao smooth with 4 tablespoons of the chao liquid and add 1/2 teaspoon of sate chili oil.
Serve with 500g of fresh rice vermicelli, dipping the water spinach and bok choy in as you eat.
Tips
Rubbing salt over the duck and rinsing it off is the fastest way to take the smell away, with no wine or ginger needed.
Blending the taro with unsweetened oat milk thickens and enriches the broth without any added starch.
kOBE Monk Fruit Blend dissolves more slowly, so mashing it into the chao and leaving it 5 minutes gives a smooth marinade that soaks in evenly.
The fried taro only goes in at the last minute, since going in early breaks it down into porridge.
A full 2 hours of chilled marinating is what carries the flavour into the middle of the duck.
The red of the pot comes from the red chao and the annatto oil, so more annatto oil deepens it while more chao only makes it salty.
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.