Vietnamese Tacos – Homemade corn tortillas with Lemongrass Prawns, and Turmeric Dill Fish (Cha Ca)

In Lucky Peach #2, there was an article by Harold McGee on dry-aging and he examines our perception of food through our experience with it via our taste and smell receptors. He uses the example of coriander which has a love-hate divide and looks at it from a cultural experience. If you have grown up with it, like I have, then you will generally finding it a pleasing herb but if you are not accustomed to its taste, you may find it strange and repulsive. Harold identifies Vietnamese and Mexican cuisine as being common users of coriander, so if you grew up with Vietnamese food where coriander is frequently used as a garnish, than you’re likely to be receptive of Mexican food and its regular use of coriander like in guacamole and salsas.

My conclusion – If you like Vietnamese food, you will enjoy Mexican food too due to a shared love for coriander.

Lucky Peach #2 also featured a recipe for Korean Ssam burritos, an idea that David Chang conceived in 2005 but never really took off for his restaurant. However, since 2009 Korean style tacos have taken the LA food truck scene by storm by Roy Choi and his Kogi Korean BBQ trucks.

My conclusion – If you can make Korean style burritos then you can make Vietnamese style ones too (note the conclusion above that Vietnamese and Mexican food is meant to be together). Vietnamese like wrapping stuff up and filling things too like rice paper rolls, banh cuon and banh xeo.

After reading Lucky Peach #2, I was inspired to come up with my own style of tacos – a fusion of Vietnamese and Mexican cuisine. I present to you Vietnamese style tacos.

 Taco Ingredients

Vietnamese Lemongrass Prawn Taco

Vietnamese Turmeric and Dill Fish (Cha Ca) Taco

I decided to make some “tacos de camarones” (prawn tacos) and “taco de pescado” (fish tacos). For the prawn tacos, I cooked some Vietnamese lemongrass prawns and accompanied it with salsa, topped with some coriander. For the fish tacos, I cooked Cha Ca which is a famous Hanoi dish comprising of turmeric and dill marinated fish which is grilled or fried, and generally served with more dill, other herbs, crushed peanuts on top of rice noodles. It’s one of my favourite Vietnamese fish dishes, so fragrant, simple to make and really tasty. If you ever travel to Hanoi, Cha Ca is one of those must try dishes like pho.

You can use store bought tortillas or make your own. I tried to make tortillas from scratch for the first time. When I was looking up how to make tortillas, I settled with corn tortillas as they were the easiest to make. All you have to do is mix together masa corn flour with warm water. The corn tortillas turned out great but I think that next time I will try to make flour tortillas as I think they will provide a better base for the fillings (note:  flour tortillas were used for the Korean Ssam burittos recipe featured in Lucky Peach #2). I was going to buy a tortilla press but was given a tip by Matt of Abstract Gourmet that the same effect can be achieved with a chopping board, using it as a weight to press onto the dough, which is how Marcelita’s empanadas are made.

I put everything together with a squeeze of lime over the top and was really happy with my efforts. I had no doubt while I was frying up the lemongrass prawns and turmeric dill fish that they would be great fillings because they are delicious on their own, and the flavours worked out well wrapped up in a hot corn tortilla.

I will keep working on my idea of Vietnamese tacos – learn to make flour tortillas and keep experimenting with different fillings…and maybe one day, when the bureaucracy permits, I will have my own food truck which I will call "Apocalypse Now" (in reference to the film) and serve my Vietnamese tacos to the masses!

All recipes below.

Corn Tortillas

(adapted from Gourmet Traveller)

Ingredients

•    2 cups masa flour
•    pinch of salt
•    1 ¼ cup warm water

Method

Place the masa flour in a bowl with a pinch of salt, then add in the warm water. Mix together with your hands to form a soft pliable dough. Form into a ball, cover with plastic wrap or a damp tea towel and rest for at least 20 minutes.

Divide the dough into 16 pieces and roll each piece into a ball.

Prepare a plastic sheet and place a ball inside it, then place a heavy wooden chopping board on top and press down hard to flatten the dough into a thin disc. Set aside on greaseproof paper.

Or

Line a tortilla press with greaseproof paper or plastic, place a ball on it and press gently but firmly in press to form a thin disc. Set aside on greaseproof paper.

Heat a frying pan on medium-high heat without any oil. Peel greaseproof paper from the tortilla and cook the tortilla, turning twice until slightly browned. Repeat with remaining tortillas.

Stack cooked tortillas in a large bowl lined with a tea towel as you go and rest to steam gently and soften slightly (3 minutes).

Vietnamese Turmeric and Dill Fish (Cha Ca)


Ingredients

•    400g firm white fish fillets (I used cod), cut into 2cm pieces

Turmeric and Dill Marinade
•    1 tablespoon crushed garlic
•    2 tablespoon shallots, finely diced
•    ½ tablespoon grated galangal (or ginger)
•    1 tablespoon dill, chopped
•    pinch of ground salt and black pepper
•    1 teaspoon turmeric powder
•    2 tablespoons fish sauce
•    2 ½ teaspoons sugar
•    1 tablespoon vegetable oil

Method

Mix the fish pieces thoroughly with the turmeric and dill marinade, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

Heat some oil in a frying pan or grill and cook the fish until it is evenly brown on each side and cooked through.

Vietnamese Lemongrass Prawns


Ingredients

•    15 prawns, shelled and deveined
•    2 stalks lemongrass, peeled and sliced into thin rounds (use bottom third only)
•    2 shallots, roughly chopped into small pieces
•    2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped into small pieces
•    1-2 fresh red chillies, deseeded and roughly chopped
•    pinch of ground salt and black pepper
•    ½ teaspoon sugar
•    1 teaspoon fish sauce
•    2 teaspoons vegetable oil

Method

Pound the lemongrass, shallots and garlic together in a mortar and pestle, then add in salt, pepper, sugar and fish sauce, and pound until finely ground. Mix in vegetable oil.

Note: This can also be done with a blender or you can grate the lemongrass, shallots and garlic with a microplane and mix with other ingredients.

Marinate the prawns with the lemongrass mixture, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

Heat some oil in a frying pan or grill and cook the prawns on each side until lightly charred or the prawns have changed colour and are cooked through.

Salsa


Ingredients

•    3 ripe tomatoes
•    2 tablespoons, chopped coriander
•    ¼ red onion, finely chopped
•    1 small red chilli, finely chopped or a splash of Tabasco sauce
•    2 teaspoons olive oil
•    juice of half a lime
•    salt and pepper

Method

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and season to taste.

La Cucaracha – Taco Cart, Perth

Customer X - “Are you a Taco Truck?”

… [idiot, this station is clearly immobile]

Customer Y - “It was ages before I knew what la cucaracha was…hahaha” (nervous kind of laugher)

… [hmm I wonder how many times he has heard that one before, probably x100…]

This is what I overhear as I am waiting in line to buy some tacos from La Cucaracha (my thoughts are in italics), Perth’s one and only taco cart, yes a cart, wheeled in and wheeled out. It’s a simple little set up.

La cucaracha is a traditional Spanish folk song which became popular during the Mexican Revolution, the song depicts political opponents as cockroaches but overtime the lyrics have been adapted to provide political or social commentary, similar to Yankee Doodle. Interestingly, Los Angeles Taco Trucks used to be referred to as ‘roach coaches’ (as people were concerned about the sanitary conditions) and some even played la cucaracha as they roamed the streets.

The idea of food trucks is generating a big buzz in Australia at the moment with Sydney recently giving the green light to its first fleet of food trucks. The food truck phenomenon has blitzed Los Angeles and it looks like Australia will follow suit, in some shape or form.

What is the allure of a food truck? Maybe nostalgia for street food eating, a cheap feed, the spontaneity of it all, the ability to watch your food being cooked fresh right in front of you, the aromas which drift through the air and tell you that this is how food is meant to be enjoyed, outside in the sunshine. There’s also the cool factor because you actually found the damn truck in the first place. Food trucks are all about the seek and pursuit, the chase down the street, like when you run after the sounds of a Mr Whippy ice cream van on a hot summers day.

What I also think is good about a food truck is that they only offer a few items, but do it really well and they are generally simple things too like tacos, burgers, dumplings, buns, hot dogs, kebabs, sandwiches, cupcakes (ie: food that you eat with your hands) and often simple foods can be the most satisfying. A physical restaurant needs a larger menu and when many things are offered, inevitably some items on the menu will be really good, while others are just there to fill up space. In addition, when you get food from a food truck, you know exactly when you want, with a limitation on choice, you don’t have to deal with the indecision often faced at restaurants.

Yes, I really do like the idea of food trucks.

I think that Perth has been quite lucky in that even though we don’t have food trucks per se, over the past year with the advent of the Twilight Hawker Markets and many festivals (Beaufort Street Festival, Angove Street Festival, William Street Festival just to name a few), we have had a lot of food stalls popping up such as the likes of Marcelita’s Empanadas, Red Hot Spatula’s Asian Tapas, Ole Paella, Fumi's Japanese Pancakes & Noodles, Dracula Catering and El Asador Argentinean cuisine which are all essentially an immobile food truck. The stalls set up in one place, sell food and then pack down, which is how food trucks have to work too as they can’t just set up anywhere. While food trucks seem to be born free, in actual fact, they are quite regulated with the current trial of food trucks in Sydney required to operate around the closing times of existing cafes and restaurant, and even in Los Angeles there are restrictions on food trucks as to where they can park and for how long. A barrier against food trucks operating in the Perth scene is that the Council views it as providing unwanted competition to established, rate-paying restaurants. Hopefully in the future Perth’s position on food trucks will change but at least now we have heaps of awesome food stalls to enjoy. 

So I had heard about La Cucaracha through the grape vine and I stumbled across it as I was checking out the Laneway Night Markets (Hook and Lock Lanes in Northbridge), held over the weekend of 28-29 January, which was a part of the Fringe Festival 2012. At the moment La Cucaracha appears to only do small gigs at some festivals and vintage markets. “Where can we find you?” a customer asked, the dude behind the cart says “check out my website and join the mailing list at www.lacucaracha.net.au”

I ordered what was on available on the board, a beef taco and a pork taco (I’ve heard that bean ones are offered too). It’s a methodic one man operation, in a set rhythm, balls of dough appear from behind the desk to be flattened with a tortilla press, the grill is fired up with his oil spray gun and the tortillas are cooked in front of you as well as pre-roasted fall apart meat which is heated through.

The meat, from what I can detect, has been simply roasted until it’s fall apart tender and it’s tossed on top of a fresh tortilla, with a squeeze of lemon and a sprinkle of greens on top. Presented to you on a paper plate, you get a choice of four bottles of condiments. I’m not sure what they all were, I just went for the chilli sauce and squirted some over the top of my tacos.

The tacos are simple, as they should be, but satisfying.

Be prepared to wait, I was lucky that I didn’t have a long wait, but I’ve heard stories and be aware that if you eventually make it to the front of the line, it might sell out.