A Housewife’s Tale

Most of my favourite dishes ends up becoming my friends’ favourites. I think it is because I keep making them and tweaking them and they have learnt to associate that to homecooking. It started with mom’s basic recipe. She makes these mini spring rolls for parties ALL the time~

I added more stuff to her recipe coz I ended up trying to imitate these amazing spring rolls from Pagolac in Edmonton. Back when I was a poor student, going out to vietnamese food was the most affordable eating out. It dint hurt that Pagolac made such yummy lemongrass chicken and spring rolls~ So each time we went, we shared a plate of the egg rolls and eventually I figured out what was in them.

Since I had to make some for a potluck, I tried to estimate what I used in my mix.

Ingredients:
4 medium dried shiitake mushrooms (soak in water for 2 plus hours)
3 mini taro (I used mini taro because regular taro comes in GIANT piece of 2-3lbs)
2 medium sized carrot
1 lb minced pork (you can also add some shrimp, not too much to overpower everything, about 1/3 lb minced)
1 egg + 1 egg yolk (reserved white for sealing springrolls)
3 tablespoon light soy sauce
2 tablespoon fish sauce (I sometimes forget to add this so it works too~ lol)
1 tsp (white and black pepper mix, adjust accordingly, use 1/2 tsp if you don’t like pepper)
2 bundle beanthread vermicelli (soak in hot water till soften and cut up w kitchen scissors)

STEP 1 – Grate the taro and carrot (should add to about 1 1/3 cup each)
– Slice mushrooms into thin strips (should be able 1 cup)

STEP 2 – Mix all seasoning and all the above ingredients into the minced pork
– Cut up vermicelli that has been soaked in hot water till soft.
– Leave mix in refrigerator to marinate for at least an hour for flavours to sink in~

STEP 4 – Time to roll the rolls! I usually use mini ones for parties, but this time I used the medium sized ones since there are less people and Meep likes the bigger rolls.

I have not tried using authentic vietnamese egg roll sheets. I use these chinese spring roll wrappers~

HOW TO ROLL~ There are awesome directions on the back of these packages as well but Meep took these pics while I was rolling so here they are~

Be sure to pack the meat well…

Brush some egg white on the flap to seal~

This amount of mixture makes about these many rolls~

Deep fry these rolls in medium heat till golden brown~

I have been trying to get the right taste for fish sauce dipping sauce~ This is still work in progress but this version is pretty good.

Ingredients:
3 cloves garlic (minced)
2 thai bird’s eye chili (minced, I take out the seeds coz I can’t take spicy stuffs too well)
1 lime (squeezed for juice).
1 medium carrot grated
2 tablespoon sugar dissolved in 1 cup warm water
~ 2 tablespoon fish sauce (but keep adding till you get your desired taste… I used about 3 tablespoon)

Mix everything, adjust seasonings to sauce the way you would like

There you have it! Spring rolls with fish sauce dip!!!