BBQ124/17 – Imperial BBQ Pork:
Imperial BBQ Pork: Before we had kids we travelled a lot and Asia was always our favourite because of the awesome food available out there! I started this year by listing out everything I wanted to cook in my BBQ cook books but was always wanting to start cooking some of the Asian dishes I do in the kitchen on the BBQ. One of the first books I read again was The Vietnamese Market Cookbook by Van Tran and Anh Vu who were the folk behind Banhmi11 at Broadway Market. I don’t think it’s still running as I can’t find any active social media accounts but I remember the Banh Mi fondly!
This is a great recipe because the pork you cook can be used for 2 dishes: Imperial BBQ Pork Noodle Salad (Bun Cha) and Imperial BBQ Pork Vietnamese Baguette (Banh Mi)
The Meat:
The meat was a 2 kg Pork Shoulder from Puddledub – £12.99, another bargain! I chopped it in half as I had another cook planned the next night.
The Prep:
The book says the traditional Vietnamese way of cooking this is with a metal grill net. I found one on Amazon (£11.80).
In a bowl I combined chopped shallots, chopped spring onions, crushed garlic, fish sauce, salt, black pepper, chopped lemongrass, sugar, chilli powder and caramel water (melted sugar topped with water). The fish sauce was quite strong so I hoped it wouldn’t overpower the meat!
I took the 1 kg of Pork Shoulder and sliced it thinly (about 2mm slices) then added this to the marinade. I covered this with cling film and left it in the fridge for 24 hours.
The recipe calls for carrot and daikon pickle, I couldn’t find any daikon so just made a carrot pickle by using a peeler to shave thin strips of carrot then boiling water with salt and pouring it over the carrots. After 3 minutes I drained the water off and added a brine made from sugar, salt, pepper, garlic powder, lukewarm water and lemon juice. I left this in the fridge overnight.
I then made a garlic, lime and chilli dipping sauce by mixing sugar in warm water then adding lime juice, garlic, fish sauce, birds eye chilli and black pepper. I left this to sit overnight.
On the day of the cook I placed the pork in the grill basket.
The Cook:
I fired up a full chimney of Oxford Charcoal Hardwood Blend and when it was all lit I poured it over the base of the grill. After a few minutes I placed the grill basket on top.
After a few minutes I flipped it over and kept flipping it on a regular basis. It took less than 10 minutes to cook through. I checked the meat with the thermapen and it was about 75c but it’s obviously quite hard to check when the meat is so thin.
Whilst I was cooking the meat my wife cooked rice vermicelli noodles and added beansprouts, the carrot pickle, chopped mint and black pepper. I sneaked a few bits of the meat, it was so good!
Time to Eat:
With the noodle dish ready I just added some of the pork to the dish. It was looking and smelling amazing, I couldn’t wait to eat it!
Once I had eaten I made the Banh Mi for lunch the next day by smearing mayo on the top half of a baguette and a melted butter/pate mix on the bottom half. I added the carrot pickle, some pork, chilli sauce, chopped chilli, cucumber slices and coriander. It looked and smelt fantastic! It was a real struggle not to eat it there and then!
Summary:
Both dishes were incredible. Starting off with just the meat it tasted fantastic, I was wolfing loads of it down whilst I was cooking! The combination of flavours from the marinade and the charred edges from the grill were so good. The noodle dish was brilliant, reminded me of travelling in Asia eating street food – so enjoyable! The Banh Mi was amazing, I had it for lunch the next day and I kept telling my wife it was the best thing I had eaten this year! After I eat one I just wanted to keep eating them!
Great pork from Puddledub again, fantastic value and so tasty!
Both dishes were brilliant and so easy to cook, I will do these more often but cook twice as much pork next time so we can eat more of it over the week!
| Cook Equipment: | Weber Kettle |
| Cook Method: | Grill basket |
| Charcoal: | Oxford Charcoal Hardwood Blend |
| Smoking Wood: | None |
| Cook temperature: | 250C |
| Cook time: | 10m and 5m rest |
| Internal temperature: | 75c |
| Notes: | 1: Cook more of it next time! |