The Nom Nom Truck.
All Photos courtesy of Nom Nom Truck

It’s amazing what a reality show can do for your food truck.

Second place finishers on the Food Network’s "The Great Food Truck Race" and Los Angeles food truck staple, Nom Nom, have spread their love to the Bay Area.

Co-owners Jennifer Green and Misa Chien met during their time at UCLA. It was also during that time that they realized they could fill a niche in the growing food truck scene.

Nom Nom Truck owners: Jennifer Green and Misa Chien.

“It started in 2009 when we had a lot of Kogi BBQ trucks around the UCLA campus and their popularity grew out of nowhere,” says Jennifer. “I made a lot of Vietnamese food for my friends on a regular basis and I realized the lack of Vietnamese restaurants in the West LA area. Then it clicked.”

Green and Chien chose the classic Vietnamese baguette sandwich, banh mi, as their truck’s specialty not only because there was a lack of places that served it in their area, but because it’s easy to eat.

“It’s portable, it’s fast and has a fresh taste that you can’t get from a burrito or hamburger,” states Jennifer. “The great thing is that we can also put a little bit of our gourmet twist on it too. One of the most traditional banh mi ingredients is grilled pork and I grill it with honey, which is a little different than the traditional. We also have Lemongrass Chicken and Vietnamese tacos, which are like a banh mi in your hand.”

“We also work with Le Boulanger to have our bread baked especially for us from a recipe I worked really hard on.”

Deli Banh Mi sandwich.

Indeed, the perfectly crusty on the outside, pillowy on the inside French bread roll is key to a good banh mi, and it was the highlight of the sandwich when I got a chance to sample their Honey Grilled Pork version. The pickled carrots and daikon that topped the sandwich were flavored well and super fresh, but I wish I’d gotten more of them to create more of a textural and taste contrast to the sweet pork. And I missed the lack of fish sauce flavor that brings it all together.

All in all, it seemed like something similar enough to what I could get in a Vietnamese Mom and Pop shop. So what’s the big deal?

First, the size of this sandwich is double the size of one you’d get at a typical brick and mortar. Coming in at 12 inches long, it’s a torpedo of a dish. But more importantly, Nom Nom is obviously trying to appealing to those who have never had a banh mi before.

“It’s exciting to see how many people who have never had one before try it and see their reaction, says Misa. “It’s like an introduction to Vietnamese food for those who have never had it. We’re appealing to the American palate.”

Lemongrass Chicken Tacos

Their popularity has grown steadily, peaking when they started showing up on the Food Network reality show.

“We went into it wanting an adventure and it was a great way to expose our truck to a larger audience. People totally embraced us and it was great to see that feedback,” says Misa. “To see a small town embrace a food dish they’d never tasted like banh mi was a great experience.”

“We were bummed we came in second, but deep down we had to tell each other it was just a reality show. And the great thing was that we won the chance to travel and it was amazing,” says Jennifer.

Nom Nom recently acquired their third food truck and their next move was up north…at least for Misa.

“We decided on San Francisco because it’s a real foodie town and it’s been a dream of mine, personally to live up here,” she says. “We have two trucks in LA and one in San Francisco, now. I’m not complaining that I had to move up here! And the response has been great. People up here come to the truck, whereas in LA, you have to go to the people. They’re a little lazier down there.”

For now, Green and Chien don’t have any other plans to expand. “We have three babies right now and we’re focused on them,” says Jennifer.

For two women fresh out of college, running several food trucks in two major cities can be a challenge, but their goals are clear.

Misa says, “At the end of the day, we want to make people happy through our food. And as employers we want to hire staff that will work together to create an amazing company and work environment. Plus I get to build a great business with my best friend!”

Nom Nom
Twitter: @nomnomtrucksf
Facebook: Nom Nom Truck SF
Various locations throughout the Bay Area (no regular schedule)

Tet (the Vietnamese Lunar New Year celebration) officially kicks off on February 3rd, but the Vietnamese Community Center of San Francisco will be getting the party started early today with its 15th Annual Tet Festival taking place in the Tenderloin's Little Saigon (Larkin Street, between Eddy and O'Farrell). There will be firecrackers and lion dancing, games, arts and crafts, and of course, food.

For those celebrating in the South Bay, the massive Tet Festival in San Jose will be held February 5 & 6 at the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds.

This year is the Vietnamese Year of the Cat (the only animal symbol in the Vietnamese zodiac that doesn't match the Chinese zodiac). Tet is celebrated on the same day as Chinese New Year, and many of the traditions are similar. People travel home to celebrate with their family, houses are cleaned, lucky money is given to children, and special dishes are cooked.

In honor of Tet, here's a list of some of our favorite Vietnamese Eats in San Francisco:

1) Whole Roasted Dungeness Crab & Garlic Noodles (Crustacean)

Roasted Dungeness Crab, Crustacean

The An family fled Saigon in 1975 and settled in San Francisco. Since then, their two restaurants Thanh Long and Crustacean have been delighting the Bay Area with their well-guarded family recipes. The restaurants even have a secret kitchen, a small windowless room within the main kitchen, where only family members are allowed to enter to prepare special signature sauces and dishes like their famous Whole Roasted Dungeness Crab and Garlic Noodles. The crab is succulent and blooming with roasted garlic and fragrant Vietnamese peppercorns. The garlic noodles are addictively good. However, vampires (and first dates) beware, the abundance of roasted garlic in these noodles will stay with you all night.

2) Beef Pho Tai (Bodega Bistro)

Pho Tai, Bodega Bistro

The Beef Pho Tai at Bodega Bistro is one of my go-to comfort meals in town. The broth is rich and flavorful, the strips of rare steak are tender, and best of all, the thin rice noodles have a wonderful spring to them. No soggy noodles here. Bodega Bistro cooks them perfectly al dente. The style of pho here is typical of southern Vietnam, which means each bowl is served with herby fresh greens like green onions, cilantro, Thai basil, and crunchy bean sprouts. Squeeze some lime to brighten up the broth, mix up some hoisin and sriracha for your beef, and slurp away.

3) Chicken Pho Ga (Turtle Tower)

Pho Ga, Turtle Tower (Photo Credit: Jo Boston, Taking Over the World One Bite at a Time)

For a taste of northern Vietnamese-style pho, check out Turtle Tower. Flat, wide noodles, a cleansing broth, topped with only green onions and cilantro (no bean sprouts, basil, or hoisin). The Chicken Pho Ga is made with free-range chicken and features a light simple broth. If you're feeling under the weather, this nourishing bowl of goodness is a godsend.

4) Bahn Mi (Saigon Sandwich)

Bahn Mi, Saigon Sandwich (Photo Credit: Kat Lin, Kat's 9 Lives)

You can't walk through Little Saigon during lunchtime without noticing the perpetual line outside the unassuming Saigon Sandwich. The good news is that the line moves at a reasonable pace (thank you friendly Vietnamese ladies for having fast nimble fingers). The better news is that your patience will be rewarded with one of the best Vietnamese Sandwiches in town. Crusty, crackly French bread, slathered with mayo and a mystery meat sauce (tastes better than it sounds), stuffed full of meat, pate, pickled carrots and onion, cilantro and jalapeno. You can have your Bahn Mi made with grilled pork, chicken, "fanci" (steamed) pork, cold cuts, tofu, or the cult favorite, meatballs (The Xiu Mai Bahn Mi). At prices ranging from $3.50 to $4.25, this is one delicious steal of a meal.

5) Vietnamese Drinks (Lee's Sandwiches)

Rainbow Drink (Chè Ba Màu), Lee's Sandwiches

The Lee's Sandwiches on Larkin Street is part Vietnamese fast food, part mini-mart. They keep a good stock of authentic Vietnamese snacks and baked goods, but my favorite reason to walk into Lee's is the expansive beverage selection. There is Vietnamese Iced Coffee (café sua dá) of course, dripped strong, mixed with sweetened condensed milk, and poured over crushed ice. But there are also more exotic offerings like Rainbow Drink (Chè Ba Màu), a sweet, icy, colorful drink made with red azuki beans, a green pandan jelly, and buttery coconut milk. And, if you see a container of what looks like tadpoles sitting innocently next to the bottled water, don't freak out, it's just Pennyworth Drink made with basil seeds.

6) Pork Belly (Le Colonial)

Thit Kho Chien, Le Colonial

Sumptuous and elegant, you feel instantly transported to 1920's French Vietnam when you walk into the breezy dining room of Le Colonial. Chef Joe Villanueva's Thit Kho Chien is one of the best pork belly dishes I've ever tasted. It is a confit of Berkshire Pork Belly that is masterfully prepared -- with a delicately crispy, caramelized crust, and a melt in your mouth texture. It is served with pickled bok choy, Hosui pear and quail egg segments, and drizzled with savory caramel sauce and truffle oil. Simply divine. In celebration of Tet, Le Colonial will be featuring some special dishes on Thursday 2/3.

Related Story from KQED Radio News:
Vietnamese-Americans Celebrate Lunar New Year
This week marks the most important holiday of the year for Vietnamese-Americans. It's the Vietnamese Lunar New Year, and it's celebrated around the Bay Area at the annual Tet Festival.
( *first audio story is: Many Californians Await News of Loved Ones From Egypt)

Now that cold and flu season has set in, it's time to start hunting down comforting soup recipes. Besides the requisite chicken soup that we all need in our cooking arsenal, there's another kind of dish that will cure what ails you when you've contracted the creeping crud: congee. For those not in the know, congee, also known as jook, is a creamy rice porridge that's a staple in Asian cultures. Consisting of rice that's been slowly cooked down to the point that the starches disintegrate into a bowl creamy goodness -- think risotto, only cooked longer -- congee is warm and easy to digest. Plus it's gluten free by default, can be make either vegan or vegetarian, and keeps well in the refrigerator for a few days.

Congee can be eaten sweet for breakfast, but more traditional recipes add in any number of savory ingredients, such as chicken, mushrooms, onions, and egg. Simpler, blander congee recipes can be fed to infants, used as a cold/curative curative, and won't upset your stomach further when you've eaten something that doesn't agree with you. Overall, congee might be the perfect food when you need a comforting dish that's easy on your digestive system.

If you're looking for wonderful congee restaurants in the Bay Area, you've got several options:

• Gum Kuo in Oakland has an extensive congee menu, with over 20 different varieties, most under $5.
• Anh Hong serves up fabulous congee and has locations in San Francisco, Milpitas, Berkeley and San Jose.
• Hakka Restaurant in San Francisco has an impressive congee menu that includes both bland and more elaborate versions -- including frog!
• Sui Tofu, or Yang-Pyeong Sin-Nae Seoul Hae-Jang-Guk in Santa Clara serves up congee with a series of little side dishes that adds to your jook experience.

Congee is also easy to make at home. I like adding a tablespoon of butter or olive oil with just a sprinkling of curry powder, or else I make a more elaborate chicken jook for those days when I want something meaty. The recipe below is perfect for when you're not feeling well and find yourself craving a dish that's warm, nourishing, and easy to prepare.

Simple Vegetarian Congee

Makes: 6 servings

Ingredients:
6 dried shiitake mushrooms
1 cup short-grain or glutinous rice (which is gluten-free, by the way)

4 cups vegetable stock

4-8 cups water

1 2-inch knob of ginger, peeled and diced

1 large carrot, peeled and finely diced
1 small head of bok choy, chopped

1 teaspoon salt + more to taste

4 tablespoons scallions, finely chopped

Preparation:
1. Soak mushrooms in enough hot water to cover them. Once they are soft, discard water, drain mushrooms and remove the stems. Chop coarsely and set aside.

2. Rinse rice once and set aside.

3. In a medium saucepan, bring stock to a boil over high heat. Once the stock is boiling, add rice and 4 cups of water. Bring to a boil again, then reduce heat to very low, allowing to gently simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally and adding more water as necessary to create a creamy consistency.

4. After 30 minutes, add mushrooms, ginger, carrots, and bok choy. Let cook for another 60 minutes, continuing to add water and stir occasionally. You'll need to stir and scrape the bottom of the pot every few minutes to keep from burning.

5. Once you've got a nice, creamy consistency and most of the rice grains have melted away into the stock, salt to taste. Serve hot in individual bowls and garnish with minced scallions.

The Lunar New Year, or Tet as my peeps call it, brings with it many favorite dishes. Fatty pork and sugar dominate the holiday table, harking back to a time when ingredients fat and sweet were much more difficult to obtain, precious to use, and delightfully rare to enjoy.

While I can now buy a 10-pound bag of sugar and an equal amount of meat for less money than a couple of movie tickets, the most traditional new year's dishes are still special for one resource that does remain valuable: time.

Soi Nuoc is one of those meditative, celebratory foods for me. It means, literally, Sticky Rice in Water. Unlike the Chinese, the Vietnamese can be rather literal and unromantic when naming their food. No matter. Who needs fancy language when you have in your hands a beautiful bowl with pale, round balls of chewiness floating in spicy-sweet ginger syrup? Inside hides a spoonful of rich filling: black sesame seeds or red bean paste or golden mung beans bound with lard. (These days, butter or oil makes a fine substitute for those of us watching our pork intake.)

Each perfect dumpling evokes purity and completeness. It celebrates the return of the festive, fertile full moon. It embodies the richness and sweetness of life. The sweet rice dumpling even inspire poets, such as the famed Ho Xuan Huong, an 18th-century Vietnamese woman famous for her intimate, elegant verses:

My body is white and my destiny round,
I float and sink, water and mountain.
Hard or soft, I depend on the skills of
the person who kneads me.
Despite everything, I always keep
a consistent heart.

In China, where they're known as yuan xiao or tang yuan, the dumplings are traditionally served during the Lantern Festival, which falls on the 15th day of the 1st lunar month. During an especially important season, the festival comes on the first full moon of the new year and marks the end of the new year festivities. Here in San Francisco, this is typically the time when the Chinese New Year parade winds its way up the streets of Chinatown. The dumplings are also enjoyed throughout the year at many dessert houses throughout the Bay Area. Look for them on menus at your favorite Chinese restaurant or boba tea house.

The recipe for soi nuoc is very simple. You can buy finely ground glutinous rice at nearly all Asian markets (look for California's own Blue Star Mochiko, produced by the Koda family in the San Joaquin Valley since the late 1940s). You'll need just a handful of other basic ingredients, a friend or two to help roll, several more to eat, and -- most importantly -- a break in your routine to enjoy the simple, sweet things in life.

GINGER SYRUP

1 1/2 cups sugar
2 cups boiling water
3 inches ginger root, peeled and crushed

In a small, heavy pot, melt the sugar over medium-high heat. Swirl for even melting, but do not stir to avoid crystallization. When the sugar is a dark amber, remove from heat and pour in the water -- take care, as it may splatter. Stir to melt the sugar completely. Add the ginger, return to low heat, and simmer for 10 minutes.

Alternatively, dissolve dark brown sugar in water and simmer with the ginger for 10 minutes. Don't tell your mom.

Remove the chunks of ginger and set the sauce aside.

SESAME FILLINGS

1/2 cup white sesame seeds
1/2 cup black sesame seeds
6 tablespoons lard or melted butter, divided
4 tablespoons sugar, divided
Salt

Toast the sesame seeds separately, taking care not to scorch them. In a mortar or pestle, blender or mini food processor, combine the white sesame seeds with 3 tablespoons butter, 2 tablespoons sugar and a pinch of salt. Puree to a thick, coarse paste. Transfer to a small bowl. Repeat with the black sesame seeds. Set both aside.

SWEET RICE DUMPLINGS

2 1/4 cups glutinous rice, plus more for kneading
1 cup very hot water

To make the dough: Place the rice in a large bowl and make dimples all over the surface with your fingers to encourage faster incorporation of the water. Pour the water evenly over the surface of the rice in a spiral, then immediately stir with a wooden spoon to mix into a shaggy dough. Transfer to a clean surface and knead for about 5 minutes to obtain a smooth, soft dough. Sprinkle lightly with additional rice flour, if needed, to prevent sticking to your hands or to the work surface. Roll the dough into a long log, cut into 24 pieces, and set aside, covered with a moist cloth.

To form the dumplings: Roll each piece of dough into a ball, flatten slightly, and then pinch up the outer edge to create a small bowl. Place about 1/2 teaspoon of sesame filling into the center, then gather up the side and pinch together to seal tightly. Roll again between your palms, pressing gently, to create a smooth ball. Continue with 18 of the pieces. Cut the remaining 6 pieces of dough into 4 smaller pieces, then roll each of those into a compact ball with no filling.

To cook the dumplings: Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add the large, filled dumplings and boil for about 5 minutes. Add the small, unfilled dumplings and continue boiling for another 2 to 3 minutes. The dumplings will float to the surface of the water as they cook. Turn occasionally to keep them moist and evenly cooked.

Remove them from the water with a slotted spoon, place in a bowl of cold water to rinse away excess starch, and then transfer to the ginger syrup. Serve in individual bowls, mixing large dumplings with small ones and drizzling generously with the syrup.

Watch This Week in Northern California tonight, Friday February 26 at 8pm to see Leslie Sbrocco, host of Check, Please! Bay Area in a new segment on local food and wine trends. This week, a conversation about celebrating the food and traditions of the Chinese New Year with Bay Area Bites bloggers, Thy Tran and Stephanie Im.

Vietnamese Coffee, Trung Nguyen

Enjoying your slow-drip coffee is a quintessential part of life in Vietnam. Whether you're stoopin' it, shouting your order down the street to the local coffee cart on the corner, or enjoying a carefully prepared cup in an upscale coffee house, Vietnamese coffee is meant to be savored and enjoyed to the max.

One reason is the time it takes to brew a cup. Vietnamese coffee is not for the rushy-rushy. Single servings are brewed through a simple metal filter called a Phin, which takes a good 5-10 minutes to produce a cup. The filter is fitted over the top of a cup, or glass (if you're making iced coffee), the grounds are placed inside the filter (about the same size grind as what you would use for a French press), a small weighted piece is placed on top, and then hot water is poured into the chamber.

Vietnamese coffee, Phin filter

Another reason to approach the experience with leisure is simply the heavenly flavor. Like espresso, Vietnamese coffee is deep and rich, and a little goes a long way. What makes it really stand out though in my mind, is its incredible buttery aroma and flavor. It wasn't until I bought some roasted beans from a mom-and-pop coffee/tea shop that I learned why exactly the coffee tasted so buttery -- you got it, it's because the beans are actually roasted in clarified butter! Brilliant.

As if that doesn't sound decadent enough, sweetened condensed milk is typically used in lieu of cream and sugar both for practical reasons (it doesn't have to be refrigerated) and for taste (Have you had sweetened condensed milk lately? Think creamy, thick, dulce de leche goodness...in your coffee...everyday!). This is why Vietnamese coffee is a habit I could really get used to.

Vietnamese Iced Coffee (Ca Phe Sua Da)

In Saigon, with so much fantastic coffee everywhere we turned, it was tough to be too discriminating. So, I left it to the locals to show me the way. Vietnam is a country of food-lovers and total coffee addicts. My favorite conversation starter was asking a local: Where is the best food in town? People would bubble over with recommendations and loved talking about their favorite food, where to get it, and how to eat it. Everyone had an opinion.

One afternoon, over a Lazy Susan laden with dim sum, an impassioned discussion over the most delectable banh xeo, the silkiest tofu, the best hand-pulled noodles with half a crab on top, turned into a full-on debate over where to grab coffee afterward. One fellow named Nguyen insisted, "The best coffee is at my sister's place," and after a few nods of acquiescence from his accompanying friends, we were off to taste for ourselves if he was indeed correct.

We hopped on our motorbikes and went caravanning off through the maze of commuters. Put-putting over main highways, over to District 7 we went...on a mission for the perfect Ca Phe Sua Da (iced coffee with sweetened condensed milk). It was spontaneous, exhilarating, and as the wind whipped through my hair, I couldn't help but envision Anthony Bourdain's crew on our tracks, kicking up some dust behind us.

Saigon Motorbike Ebb and Flow

What we came upon was a breezy little oasis of an internet cafe, tucked away amongst sprawling new developments and construction sites. The cafe itself is called Goc Peo, but the main signage outside speaks to the main reason for visiting -- the rich and aromatic Trung Nguyen coffee served.

Coffee time at Trung Nguyen

Trung Nguyen seems to have made a nice business for itself, their chains and signs are all over Saigon, as well as the airport gift shop, and while the prices are expensive by Vietnamese standards, they are still relatively cheap by US standards (a cup of their famous "Legendee Coffee" was about $2 USD). Incidentally, Trung Nguyen has a pretty comprehensive website that explains all about what defines Vietnamese coffee and makes it unique, namely:

1) The topography of the Annamite Range has allowed for a diverse variety of beans to flourish in Southeast Asia. By blending a variety of bean species (Arabica, Robusta, Excelsa and Catimor) rather than sticking to a single-source (like 100% Arabica), a broader flavor range is achieved.
2) A lower-temperature, longer roasting process that is stable and consistent.
3) Roasting the beans in clarified butter.

Another interesting fact I learned about Trung Nguyen's coffee is that they produce what they call their Legendee Coffee, a "unique enzymatically-treated coffee that releases flavors bound in the beans and not released under ordinary processing." The Legendee Coffee was what Nguyen brought us to taste. Read more about the Legend of Legendee and how modern science has attempted to reproduce the infamously expensive (and kinda gross) Kopi Luwak coffee, made with the help of the weasel-like civit.

My final verdict? The Legendee was worth experiencing, although a little intense for me to want to drink on a daily basis.

Vietnamese Iced Coffee, Trung Nguyen

Regardless, it was a joy to spend an afternoon in pursuit of the perfect cup with company who really loved their coffee. Company who loved it so much, they continued on their way, buzzing away to the next cup as we rookie tourists bid farewell.

ADDRESS

Goc Peo
So 16 Duong 8B, KDC Trung Son
Nguyen Van Cu noi dai – TP. Ho Chi Minh City
Vietnam

One of my favorite culinary mash-ups of recent years is the Vietnamese-Chinese-Cajun crawfish boil served with rice or garlic noodles. Following the arc of families moving from Vietnam to New Orleans to Southern California to, finally, San Jose and San Francisco, mud bugs have taken a garlicky turn and shown up, of all places, in Little Saigon's across the country.

Red Crawfish in San Francisco's Tenderloin is the one closest and dearest to me, as I head over that way anytime I'm craving familiar, comforting flavors. Boiled crawfish is a new tradition among my peeps, but it's one that I'm very happy to adopt, too.

Eating here is a dress-down, messy affair that requires friends with absolutely no pretensions about food. The red, steaming, spicy crawfish come out from the kitchen in pails and are plopped down on the paper-topped table inside plastic bags, rather than piled right on the table, to hold in all that the thick, rich broth.

I love very spicy food and found that the medium was just fine for me. If you're hungry and a bit of a glutton, you could eat two pounds of crawfish with nothing else, but it's definitely hard to resist popular side orders like batter-fried sweet potatoes, buttery garlic noodles, buttery garlic toast, or just plain rice. You can also order potatoes and corn on the cob, and they'll throw them right in with the crawfish. If you don't suck the heads (and the purists among us would insist that you do), you should at least order some garlic noodles or a bowl of rice for soaking up all the juicy goodness that spurts out of each one.

There are other entrees on the Red Crawfish's menu -- the usual suspects of Vietnamese fare dominates over the Cajun influence -- but I haven't yet strayed far from the namesake of the restaurant. The huge bowl of spicy seafood soup is definitely worth sharing, while next on my list is one of my favorite dishes, bun rieu, seafood and tomato-tinged broth served over rice noodles.

For the DIY folks, there's also plenty of local crawfish harvested from the Sacramento Delta and from California's rice fields. Although the Isleton Crawdad Festival was canceled last month, another victim of the recession, you can still pick up live mud bugs (more for the rest of us!) from Bob's Bait Shop a.k.a. The Master Baiter. Located near the Sacramento Delta and the premier sources of live bait in the area, the shop also provides local crawfish for cooks picky about freshness. Be sure to call in advance, especially if you need more than 15 pounds. Check also with large Asian supermarkets near you, especially 99 Ranch Market, where crawfish can often be found crawling around live in the tanks.

Those of us who have no shame will even ask the server at Red Crawfish to leave all the shells on the table so that, at the end of the meal, we can bag them up, spices and all, to make a very tasty stock back at home. Add some Cajun trinity, some dark roux, stir in a little heavy cream and lots of dry sherry, pull out a blender and a mesh strainer -- and you have a pot of mighty tasty soup.

RED CRAWFISH
611 Larkin Street
San Francisco, CA 94109
(415) 771-1388
Map

BOB'S BAIT SHOP
302 2nd Street
Isleton, CA 95641
(916) 777-6666 or (916) 777-6806
Map

Lucky me, the flu came visiting last week. Even after three days of sleeping in bed and swallowing nothing more than bananas and Advil, I could tell my uninvited guest had no intention of leaving. Time to get serious.

Cooking was out of the question -- I could barely stand up straight with the long, invisible spikes piercing both sides of my brain -- so I smiled as sweetly as possible at my husband and said three words: Pho ga. Please.

He'd never made the soup before nor did he have a mother who cooked it once a week, so I scribbled down some notes on a scrap of paper. I fell back asleep before he left for the grocery store, and by the time I woke up again, blessed me, I could smell the lovely scent of star anise and cinnamon and ginger all the way into the bedroom.

Now, lest you think that I'm married to a kitchen wizard, let me just say that during the five years he lived alone, the only meat he ever bought was bacon and he never, ever, not once, turned on his oven. Fortunately, the best foods for the soul are always the simplest.

Pho ga is an excellent way to prepare meals ahead of time. My mom used to simmer the chicken on Sunday, boil a big batch of noodles, wash all the herbs, and then refrigerate the components separately. It only takes about 10 minutes to reheat the stock and noodles for a comforting bowl of soup anytime during the week.

Eating my way through my husband's very first pot of pho ga brought me back to the land of the living. Here, verbatim, is the recipe:

Half-Conscious Notes on Making Pho Ga

Preparation
1. Cut chicken in half & pull off fatty chunks @ tail

2. Cover with cold water. Add onion (halved), some carrot logs, lots of star anise (8-10) a few cloves, teaspoon of peppercorns, and cinnamon stick. And Bay Leaf for the French. Add giblets, etc. & fennel seeds.

3. Bring just [double underlined] to a boil, then lower heat, cover partially & simmer gently 1 1/2 hour.

4. Remove chicken. remove big chunks of meat & return carcass. continue simmer 2-3 hrs.

Shopping List and Additional Notes

Ingredients
One 4-5 pound chicken
1 package wide rice noodles
A small hand of ginger
1 large onion
1 small carrot
Spices: star anise, cinnamon stick (preferably Vietnamese cassia), peppercorns, cloves, fennel seed
Fish sauce
Fried shallots

Fresh herbs: scallions, cilantro, Thai basil, saw-leaf herb, Bay leaf (optional)
Mung bean sprouts
Lime wedges
Fresh Thai chiles

This is the dream list for a homemade bowl of pho ga. Decent shortcuts include using good-quality, prepared stock and the meat of a rotisserie chicken. If you keep a box of premixed spice packets in your pantry (they look like big teabags), you can infuse plain chicken stock with Vietnamese flavors in 20 minutes. I've been known to enjoy a bowl of pho with only scallions for garnish, but each additional herb really does make a huge difference.

When buying rice noodles for this soup, look for the words banh pho ga on the label. If you're lucky enough to find fresh ones, you'll just need to immerse them for 10 or 15 seconds in very hot water. Dried noodles require 2 to 3 minutes of boiling.

I have a wide, extremely sharp cleaver that eases right through chicken bones. Halving chickens is also super simple if you have good kitchen shears. If you don't have a pair...get some. One of the must useful tools ever. Look for the heavy-duty ones with a round indentation at the base of the blades; that's what allows you to snip through the ribs and along the backbone. For those who think this all too much, just go ahead and buy chicken parts (bone-in!), but be sure to simmer the meat for only 30 or 40 minutes before stripping it off the bones. Having exposed bone marrow extracts more flavor. Besides, anyone who's tried to remove a whole chicken from a pot of simmering water can vouch for the wisdom of chicken halves or parts.

If you can, throw in a few extra chicken wings or, best of all, a couple of feet.

My family never bothered to strain the soup. All the aromatics and bones sink to the bottom of the pot, and we'd just ladle the soup from the top. If you prefer, though, you can strain the stock and reheat.

Vinegared onions are a favorite topping that's rarely available in restaurants. To make your own:
1. Slice an onion very thinly.
2. Drizzle generously with white vinegar.
3. Stir in lots of coarsely ground black pepper.
4. Let stand for 10 minutes and then serve alongside the herb platter.

Arrange sprigs of the fresh herbs, lime wedges, bean sprouts and chiles on large platters for finishing the soup at the table. Set a big bottle of fish sauce right on the table, too, because this is a Vietnamese meal, after all.

I like to pour boiling water (from cooking the noodles) over the bean sprouts to blanch them so they aren't hard and cold in the soup. (Shhhh, don't tell my Saigon-born mom. That's a Northern trick that I adopted after leaving home.)

For each diner, place a small nest of noodles in a large, preheated bowl. Cover with very hot stock and add a handful of shredded chicken. Sprinkle with chopped scallions, chopped cilantro and fried shallots. Let guests fine-tune their bowls with herbs and other flavorings as desired.

What do you do when the rain won't relent, when those gorgeous bay windows welcome in the wind, and when staying home in your pajamas is not only comfortable but life-saving?

Why, make soup, of course!

Soup of the Day

Yesterday's soup highlighted a lucky pantry find -- a forgotten can of Italian white beans. First into the pot went a lonely though generously proportioned carrot, two stalks of celery, a tight-skinned onion, and the final sprigs of holiday herbs: oregano, thyme, rosemary, and parsley. After these were sauteed to fragrant softness, in followed chicken stock, hand-torn plum tomatoes plus their juices, and those toothsome white beans.

I let the pot simmer for as long as it took to read a few chapters from The Ladies No. 1 Detective Agency. For an extra chapter, I tossed in some leftover roasted potatoes, the last of the red wine jus from the New Year's rib roast, then any and all dark greens hiding out in the fridge. That meant, for this pot, some slightly wilted mustard and a wedge of ever hardy cabbage.

Sense a theme here? A simmering soup pot is the best way to clean out your kitchen while steaming up your windows. Slice some bread, pull out the biggest mugs you have, and -- voila! -- the best food ever for curling up on the couch.

Mandu Soup

Around now, the first of the year, is also the time to enjoy ddeok mandu guk, Korean dumplings served in a simple broth. My friend Jineui invited me over to her brand-spanking-new kitchen in Sacramento to celebrate the start of a delicious 2008. Her promise to make mandu was all I needed to hop in the car.

Some dedicated cooks still make their mandu dough by hand, but many just buy thick, round prepared potsticker wrappers. (Be sure to look for “potsticker” on the label; “gyoza” or “wonton” wrappers are too thin for the distinctively chewy mandu texture.)

Jineui’s filling starts with ground beef and tofu that's been crushed finely between her fingers. She blanches bean sprouts then chops them. She adds minced cabbage, salt, pepper, and not much else. No sesame oil for her (“makes them taste funny”), but she does take time to squeeze moisture out of the vegetables. An egg wash helps seal the half-moons, and then the dumplings go into bamboo steamers lined with cabbage leaves.

(Photo by Jasmine Lee)

Serve the first batch of mandu straight from the steamer with dipping sauce. Serve the next few batches in bowls of clear stock with a light sprinkling of green onions and maybe some nori or egg strips if you're wanting to be fancy. Freeze the other few hundred or so mandu to eat through the rest of the winter. (I have one friend blessed with a mother who visits once a year and leaves about 2,000 or so homemade dumplings in their garage freezer before heading back across the Pacific.)

You can read how different families ring in the new year with mandu at the Kimchi Mamas. The Asia Society posted a simple recipe from the Korean National Tourism Organization, about as official as it gets for a humble dumpling, but a much more detailed recipe with helpful technique shots and lessons learned from past mistakes appears at My Korean Kitchen.

Oxtail Soup

Another Korean treat, ox-tail soup, is as easy as they come: Dump a few pounds of bones in a pot, add water plus a healthy pinch of salt, and then simmer for six hours, three if you're in a hurry. Jineui, always going the extra mile, likes to blanche her bones first for a clearer stock. During their long simmering, the bones give off their milky white goodness into a supremely flavorful broth. Serve with a spicy sesame seed dipping sauce. For those of us who live on the edge (fault lines and BSE be damned!) a bowl of liquified marrow manages to be both comforting and decadent at the same time.

What happens if you leave the pot over the wok burner instead of the special, low-flamed simmer burner? Umm...add more water and know that a few crispy brown bits floating around just means more flavor.

Vietnamese Crab Soup

On the more labor intensive side of soups comes one of my favorite Vietnamese dishes. Few restaurants even attempt to offer bun rieu, and a mere handful get it close to right. After feasting on Dungeness, I make broth with crab shells, shrimp shells and pork bones. Tomatoes add brightness, fried tofu offers some chewiness and, for old-school folks like me, cubes of freshly coagulated blood punctuate with silky richness. There's a raft of crab and shrimp bound with egg that hovers over rice noodles. And, finally, there are platters at the table piled high with sprigs of fresh mint and rau ram, chiffonade of cabbage and banana blossom, wedges of lime, tiny but fearless bird eye's chiles, and a dollop or two of shrimp paste to provide those layers of flavor that make Vietnamese food so distinctly fresh and complex.

So...what if you don't want to spend a day at the stove? Then head over to Pho King in East Oakland for a proper bowl. Di Da, one of my favorite Vietnamese restaurants in San Jose, an excellent establishment that happens to be vegetarian, also offers a wonderful, satisfying interpretation of bun rieu.

Pho King
638 International Boulevard, Oakland
(510) 444-0448

Di Da
2597 Senter Road, San Jose
(408) 998-8826

Soupsong

In my last love note to soups, I'm pointing you to the best resource ever for recipes celebratory and everyday, favorite and obscure. I fell hard for Pat Solley the "Soup Lady" a decade ago, while we were trapped in a car among the hills of West Virginia. Her job at the J. Edgar Hoover Building kinda, sorta freaked me out, but her dedication to all things brothy tugged at my heart. Of course, my stomach was never in doubt -- Pat knows more about soup history, traditions, tales, jokes and, of course, recipes from around the world than anyone else I've met. It's rare to find someone who can quote Herodotus and Bob Dylan in the same breath while cooking with all four burners going at once. She's now ensconced far away in Paris, but fortunately I keep warm with her Soupsong website and her excellent book An Exaltation of Soups.

(Illustration by D.C. Bloom)

A recent lunch with a caravan of hungry friends reminded me of the insurmountable difference between eating in America and eating in Vietnam. Even when the food is excellent, even with folks I love, even when the weather is as freaky hot as it's been this week.

Expansive menus, with dishes numbering into the three digits, and the a la carte approach to dining in the West culminated again in an experience that's difficult for me to reconcile with Vietnamese food: every single person at the table was eating something completely different.

My bowl of noodles was wedged between a dish of curry on the left and grilled beef with rice paper on the right. Across from me were fried frog legs, and at the end of the table was a pile of pork chops. When such radically different dishes are slung onto a table, the spirit of the food itself is lost.

Restaurants in Vietnam tend to specialize in one, two, maybe three variations on a single dish. Everyone in the restaurant, let alone everyone at the table, is slurping soup or wrapping shrimp together. If different courses are served, they come family style, and everyone shares from the middle of the table.

As for true family style, when the Tran clan gathers, we'll clear out the living room furniture, sit in a huge circle on the floor, and place multiple platters of the same dish to share in the middle. There's no such thing as a buffet for the cousins to pick and choose.

Then again...where would we be without American individuality? The freedom to choose, the freedom to express our inner desires, the freedom to break out of the circle, the freedom to be alone.

Clockwise around the table:

Banh hoi, delicate squares of rice noodles, define an entire class of dishes. Here, grilled beef rolls are the savory star.

Duck soup with dried bamboo shoots is a hard-to-find treat.

Shredded duck meat tossed with cabbage falls into the goi category, special salads that start formal meals or accompany congee soup.

Vietnamese "gatorade" made from salted plums and lime juice. An acquired taste for some but most definitely good for your body on the hottest days.

Chicken curry reveals the country's old ties with India and Thailand.

Hearty and spicy, bun bo hue highlights thick, round rice noodles, slices of pork, and chewy nuggets of pig's feet.

Plates of fresh herbs...

...and fresh vegetables define a southern Vietnamese table.

A generous platter of sweetly charred pork chops will feed someone for a week.

Not quite the river prawns promised, but still rich with shrimp brains.

Fried frog legs, one of the restaurant's specialties, are the upscale version of buffalo wings. Lime and black pepper add zest.

The soft, fresh tofu is fried to order.

Spring rolls the New-World way...

...and the Old-World way.

The line out front hints at the lunchtime wait at this very popular restaurant, an excellent place to compose a medley of Vietnamese dishes.

Vung Tau II Restaurant
1750 N Milpitas Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035
(408) 934-9327

It's been a long time since I've worshipped anything beyond dumplings or doughnuts on Sunday mornings, but this weekend I joined Stockton's Sikh community at their historic temple on Grant Street. The act of sharing food as spiritual devotion has deep roots in many of the world's religions. At Buddhist temples, serving vegetarian food to the public is a way to raise money for community work. At Sikh temples, offering a meal free to anyone who asks is an act of spiritual generosity mandated by the religion's founders.

As I research immigrant foodways here in Northern California, I've been struck by how temples have emerged as the center of many of these transplanted communities. In the Bay Area, there are many temples where you can experience the intersection of devotional prayers and delicious meals.

Here's a short list of three worth visiting:

Chua Duc Vien
2420 Mclaughlin Avenue (at Tully)
San Jose, California
(408) 993-9158

Chua Duc Vien is the only Buddhist temple run entirely by women in Northern California. The late Thich Dam Luu and the Vietnamese Buddhists she inspired, from small children to elders, raised money to build this temple by collecting and recycling cans, paper and cardboard for years. (Thich is Vietnamese for "Venerable," the title of respect for monks and nuns.) Serving the large and well-established San Jose Vietnamese community, it offers a place of prayer and contemplation every day of the week. You'll see women bowing with incense as part of their daily regimen next to families posing for celebratory portraits.

If you're exploring the nearby Vietnamese enclaves, it's a peaceful place to rest after the bustle of Lion Plaza to the east or the sheen of Grand Century Mall to the north. For those tempting fate, there's a small room to the side of the temple where you can pray for your fortune. Watch those before you to get the knack of tossing the numbered sticks -- it's all about the wrists -- then find a friendly person to translate the corresponding message.

The temple welcomes visitors, and on Sundays, the nuns erect a tent to serve vegetarian versions of popular Vietnamese dishes and special sweets such as banh cam, perfectly round, sesame-sprinkled "orange cakes." On a recent visit, they were serving one of my favorites soups, bun rieu, with thin rice noodles, tofu puffs and fresh tomatoes. The food is neither fancy nor expensive, but all proceeds go to the nuns' community work.

Sikh Gurdwara Sahib
1930 S. Grant Street (at E. 5th)
Stockton, California

This Stockton temple holds a place of pride for California Sikhs. Built on land purchased in 1912, it was the first gurdwara("doorway to the guru") built in the U.S by early immigrants from the Punjab who worked in the nearby orchards and along the transcontinental railway. Since then, many other gurdwaras have been built, including the Gurdwara Sahib in Fremont and the impressive Sri Guru Nanak Gurdwara in Yuba City. All have kitchens that will serve food to anyone who appears at the temple and asks, no matter what time of the day or night. In Stockton, nearly 1,000 people flow through the lunch line every Sunday, and on important holidays, the temple may feed 10,000 to 20,000 visitors.

One of the central institutions of the Sikh religion is the langar, the communal meal where volunteers help prepare, serve and clean. Sharing food emphasizes the equality and brotherhood of the Sikh religion. Requiring all community members and visitors to eat the same food together in the same room at the same time has special significance within the context of India's historical caste system. Prayers and recitations accompany the meal, a reminder of the importance of a contemplative life.

Simple but well-spiced, satisfying vegetarian food comes from the langar's kitchen, including vegetable curries, flatbreads, dal, and fresh salads. Breakfast might be paratha with fenugreek greens, served with a generous dollop of whipped butter. In the afternoon, you might snack on caulifower pakora, dried dates and a selection of sweets with chai. Within the temple, you may also be offered karah prashad, a rich, sweet pudding made from flour, butter and sugar. Served after a priest has recited prayers, the prashad is holy food. Accept the prashad with both hands and be sure to to ask for a small amount if you don't think you can finish all of it.

There is no charge for the food prepared in the langar, and since Sikhs do not proselytize, you needn't worry that their free meals are an attempt to convert you. When you visit a gurdwara, remember to wear clothing that allows you to sit modestly on the floor. Both men and women must cover their hair and remove their shoes before entering.

At the Stockton gurdwara: Making enough roti for a thousand hungry people involves ten women patting and rolling dough from 6 to 10 every Sunday morning.

Wat Mongkolratanaram
a.k.a. The Thai Buddhist Temple
1911 Russell Street (at Martin Luther King, Jr. Way)
Berkeley, California 94703
(510) 849-3419

If you haven't yet been to Berkeley's Thai Temple, then you're missing one of the best community meals in the Bay Area. It's pretty well established, so you'll need to arrive before 11 am to beat the lines. Tables are arranged in long rows in the shade of the temple complex, built with money raised by these weekend feasts. During holidays, dance and song are background to the meal. On regular weekends, it's one of the best places to experience the food-stall feel of Southeast Asia right here in California.

The Thai monks and the amazing women who cook the food have it figured out, from the handy silver tokens to the separate stations for drinks, desserts, soups, rice plates and -- not to be missed -- the papaya salad cut and pounded to order. (Go ahead and ask for it spicy, and don't forget the little marinated crabs.) Other treats include luscious coconut-scallion cakes and lemongrass sausage. During mango season, remember to save space for the sticky rice and fresh mangoes. Fortunately, the stalls pack food to go, so you can enjoy seconds and desserts later.

If you're expecting the best Thai food in the world and if you don't like eating at communal tables...well, this isn't the scene for you. But if you can appreciate real people cooking and sharing their food with you, then the Thai temple meals are a wonderful experience. Plan on going with friends and sharing. No subdued piety here. Since the dining area is set up outside and since the food is not part of a service, it's a casual, fun meal that still goes to a very good cause.