Lemongrass pork with noodle is a Vietnamese-inspired dish that I really enjoy eating. I often ordered this dish when I was in college. The noodle isn’t served with a soup, but it is served with a flavored-fish sauce. Sounds weird but it does get addicting. It can be served with as few as one topping, in this case the lemongrass pork, or as many as 3 or 4 other sides like crispy spring rolls or other type of meats. I think it’s delicious enough with just one topping. The majority of the work is on preparing the lemongrass pork, which is not too horrible either, I promise. This is such a delicious and quite a healthy dish for lunch or dinner (or even breakfast in our household).
LEMONGRASS PORK WITH NOODLE
Ingredients
- 1 lb of dried rice vermicelli noodles soaked until soft in water
- Few fresh lettuce leaves cut into long strips
- 1 cup of fresh mint leaves
- Large bunch of cilantro leaves
- 1 cup of chopped roasted peanuts
- 2 Tbsp of grape seeds oil or oil of your choice
Lemongrass pork:
- 2 lbs boneless pork loin
- 1 stalk of lemongrass
- 5 cloves of garlic finely minced
- 2 Tbsp of ground coriander seeds ketumbar
- 3 Tbsp of grape seeds oil or oil of your choice
- 1 ½ Tbsp table salt
- 2 Tbsp of honey or more
- Kitchen twine to secure the pork
Flavored fish sauce:
- ½ cup good-quality fish sauce
- ½ cup sugar
- ¼ cup distilled white vinegar
- 2 cloves garlic finely minced
- 2 red Thai chilis stemmed and finely chopped
Pickled carrots:
- 1 large carrot peeled and finely julienned carrots
- ¼ cup distilled white vinegar
- Small pinch of table salt
- ¼ cup sugar
Instructions
Preparing the lemongrass pork (prepare one day before):
- Trim off the bottom woody and upper woody part of lemongrass. Peel off few outer layers and then finely sliced into rings. Run your knife again through the rings to finely minced them. Set aside.
- Mix the chopped lemongrass with garlic, coriander seed, salt, and oil to form a thick paste for marinading the pork. Place the pork on a clean chopping board and run your knife from one end of the loin and make a cut cross-wise and continue until the other end of the loin. So, the meat should open up like a book, but you're not cutting them into half, just splitting it open. Use a meat mallet or heavy object to gently pound on the pork so they spread out thinner, but don't break the meat apart. Spread the marinade paste you prepared earlier on the meat. Gently roll the pork into a long cylinder. Use a kitchen twine to secure the meat. Place this on a rimmed baking sheet. Wrap with plastic wrap and let it marinade in the refrigerator over night
- When ready to cook the meat, get the meat out of the refrigerator to let it reach room temperature before roasting. Brush the pork with some honey. Preheat the oven to 325 F and roast the pork for about 1 1/2 hours or until pork is cooked through. When it's cooked, cover with aluminum foil and let it rest for at least 30 minutes before slicing the pork
Preparing the noodles and pickled carrots:
- Mix all the ingredients for pickled carrots in a small bowl and stir until the sugar dissolves. Let it sit for at least 30 minutes before using and then drain off the liquid, we're just using the pickled carrots here
- Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Cook the noodles until it is soft, but not mushy, about 2-3 minutes. Drain off water and toss with some oil. Get individual serving bowl out. Portion the noodles out. Place some shredded lettuce, mints, pickled carrots, cilantro leaves and slices of pork on top of the noodles. Topped with some peanuts. Have the diners drizzle the flavored fish sauce on the noodle, they can add more or less as they wish
Did you make this recipe?Please leave me a comment below and tag @whattocooktoday and #WhatToCookToday on Instagram
