Lemongrass Chicken Vermicelli Bowl

Method

1. Marinate the chicken. Combine the chicken with all marinade ingredients and set aside for at least 20 minutes, or up to 24 hours refrigerated. The lemongrass pieces are there to perfume, not to be eaten, so keep them big.
2. Make the nước chấm first. Stir the fish sauce, rice vinegar, sugar and water until the sugar fully dissolves, then add the garlic, chili and lime juice. Taste on a shred of lettuce; it should be punchy, sweet, sour and salty all at once. Set aside; it improves as it sits.
3. Cook the vermicelli. Boil or soak the noodles according to the packet, usually 2 to 3 minutes. Drain, rinse thoroughly under cold water, and drain very well. Wet noodles water the dressing down, so leave them in the colander while everything else happens.
4. Prepare the vegetables. Julienne the carrot and cucumber, slice the lettuce, rinse the sprouts and pick the herbs. Everything stays raw and at room temperature.
5. Sear the chicken. Pick the lemongrass pieces off the chicken. Heat a skillet, grill pan or barbecue to medium-high and cook the thighs 4 to 5 minutes per side, until deeply browned with charred edges and 74°C at the thickest point. The sugar in the marinade wants to burn, so move the pieces if they darken too fast rather than turning the heat off. Rest 5 minutes, then slice.
6. Assemble at the table. Noodles in the base of each bowl, vegetables and herbs in piles on top, sliced chicken over the middle. Pour 3 to 4 tablespoons of nước chấm over each bowl at the table and toss before eating.

Notes

• The dressing is the dish. The chicken is excellent, but a bowl with mediocre chicken and good nước chấm beats the reverse every time. Dissolve the sugar completely before the lime goes in, and always taste it on a piece of vegetable rather than from a spoon.
• Thighs, not breast. The marinade’s sugar needs fat to caramelize against, and breast dries out before it takes real colour.
• Everything except the chicken can be done a day ahead, including cooking the noodles and cutting the vegetables. That makes this one of the best hot-weather crowd dinners in the book; the chicken can also be grilled in big batches.
• The tofu sibling is lemongrass tofu vermicelli bowl, which swaps the protein and uses a vegetarian sauce with its own name rather than imitation fish sauce.

Ingredient substitutions

• Fish sauce is load-bearing in both the marinade and the dressing, and there is no neutral substitute; soy sauce makes a different, flatter dressing. Vietnamese or Thai brands (Red Boat, Squid, Three Crabs) are stocked by every Asian grocer in Germany and Canada and increasingly by supermarkets. Vegetarians should cook the tofu sibling recipe rather than substituting here, because its nước chấm chay is a real sauce in its own tradition, not a compromise.
• Lemongrass is sold fresh at Asian grocers and frozen in tubs, and frozen chopped lemongrass works well in the marinade. Dried lemongrass does not; it never softens and tastes of hay.
• Bird’s eye chili can be replaced by any small hot red chili, or reduced to rings floated on the dressing for looks with less commitment.

Sources consulted

• RecipeTin Eats: Vietnamese Noodles with Lemongrass Chicken
• Cooking Therapy: Bún Gà Nướng

Good with

• Lemongrass Tofu Vermicelli Bowl

From Christoph Mayer