The first bite of Hanoi Bun Cha I ever had came off a tiny plastic stool on Hàng Mành street, sometime around eleven in the morning. The vendor was a woman in her sixties with forearms like ropes, fanning a clamshell grill at the curb. The whole alley smelled like rendering pork fat and charcoal smoke. She handed me a chipped melamine bowl, warm to the touch, and pointed at the herb pile like it was obvious what to do next.
It was not obvious. I copied the man next to me.
The Stall on Hàng Mành That Got Me Hooked
She had no menu. There was a chalkboard taped to a pillar with the price in dong and nothing else. I gestured at the bowl in front of the regular, she nodded, and that was the entire transaction. Two minutes later she dropped a tangle of grilled patties and lacquered belly slices directly into a warm fish-sauce broth and slid it across to me with a tiny pair of scissors and chopsticks.
The broth was the part I did not expect. It was warm, not cold, and the meat juices bled into it the second the pork hit. The pickled green papaya floated up. I dipped a clump of cool noodles in, scooped a piece of mint and perilla, and pulled the bite together with my fingers like everyone else. I went back the next day. Then the day after that.
She showed me how she mixed the patties with hand gestures over the side of a steel bowl. Pork shoulder, hand-minced. Caramel for color. Shallots, garlic, fish sauce, black pepper. No lemongrass. When I pointed at a lemongrass stalk at another stall on the way home she laughed and shook her head like I had insulted her.
What Hanoi Bun Cha Actually Is
Here is what I picked up later, after I dug into it. Bún chả was reportedly invented in Hanoi in the late 19th or early 20th century by a grill master in the Old Quarter, and the city’s first dedicated shop is said to have opened on Gia Ngư street in Hoàn Kiếm. In 1959 the writer Vũ Bằng called Hanoi a town “transfixed by bún chả,” which is the right verb.
It is a lunch dish. Not dinner. Traditional shops in Hanoi grill in the morning, sell through the middle of the day, and shut down by mid afternoon. If you show up at seven in the evening looking for the real thing you are too late.
And it is not bún thịt nướng, which is the southern version, assembled in a single bowl with sauce poured over the top. Bún chả is deconstructed. The dipping bowl is warm. The pork is dunked, not drizzled. The lemongrass thing is a southern fingerprint. Most people I have cooked this for do not know this, and most recipes online get it wrong.
In 2016 Anthony Bourdain ate bún chả with Barack Obama at Bún Chả Hương Liên, and the shop is now nicknamed Bún Chả Obama. I have not been. The line is apparently absurd.
Bringing It Home
The first time I tried to make this back in California I overdid the caramel and it went bitter. The whole batch tasted like burnt sugar and regret. I tossed it.
I source the pork shoulder and the belly from a small Vietnamese butcher in San Gabriel who will hand-mince the shoulder if I ask nicely and call ahead. Green papaya I get on the same trip. Perilla and Vietnamese balm are the only fussy ingredients. I have one nursery in Westminster that always has both, and I pick up enough to last me a week because the moment I run out of perilla the dish loses its Hanoi accent.
Fish sauce matters here. I use Red Boat for the broth and a cheaper bottle for the marinade. The good stuff is wasted if you are about to caramelize it on a coal.
What I Used
- Hand-minced pork shoulder for the patties, plus thin pork belly slices for the lacquered second cut
- Vietnamese fish sauce, sugar, shallots, garlic, and freshly ground black pepper for the marinade, and no lemongrass
- A tablespoon of homemade caramel, sugar melted to deep amber and stopped with warm water
- Green papaya and carrot in thin coins, pickled with rice vinegar, sugar, and salt
- A warm dipping broth of water, fish sauce, sugar, rice vinegar, lime, bird’s eye chilies, and minced garlic
- Fresh round rice vermicelli, served at room temperature on a separate plate
- A platter of green leaf lettuce, perilla, Vietnamese balm, mint, and cilantro
- Bamboo skewers, soaked, and a chimney of charcoal lit thirty minutes before I want to eat
The Charcoal, the Smoke, the Playlist
I cook this on a Saturday. It is too involved for a Tuesday. I light the chimney out on the back step, set a beer on the railing, and put on something with horns. Khruangbin if I want to feel like I am back on a stool in the Old Quarter. Bia hơi is impossible to find here so a cold light lager does the same job.
While the coals burn down I mix the patties by hand in one direction until the meat goes tacky and springs back when I press it. That motion is the difference between a patty that holds together and one that crumbles. The pork belly slices marinate in a second bowl. I snack on rice crackers and a few of the mint leaves I am supposed to be saving for the table. Honestly I always pick too much mint anyway.
The grill is loud and smoky and ten minutes of unbroken attention. The patties go on first, three to four minutes a side until the edges char and lacquer. The belly slices come after, two to three minutes a side, until the fat is rendered and the meat caramelizes. Do not skip the charcoal if you have any way around it. The smoke is the whole point.
How I Eat It at Home
I warm the dipping broth in a saucepan. Not hot. Warm to the touch. I divide it among four wide shallow bowls. The pickled papaya goes in first. Then the hot grilled pork goes straight in, juices and all, the second it comes off the grate. That bloom of warm meat fat into the broth is everything.
Noodles on a separate plate at room temperature. Herbs piled high on a platter. Everyone builds their own bites.
It eats slow. It eats loud. People reach across each other. I prefer it on the porch in the late afternoon when the LA sun is finally tolerable and the neighbor’s bougainvillea is in the way of my view. The first time I served it here a friend asked if it was the same as bún thịt nướng. I made her eat a bite before I answered.
I am not trying to recreate Hàng Mành. I cannot. The woman with the rope forearms, the plastic stools, the alley smoke are not portable. What I can carry home is the shape of the thing, and that is enough.
Hanoi Bun Cha
Ingredients
Equipment
Method
- Make a quick caramel for color. In a small saucepan over medium-low heat, melt 2 tablespoons of the sugar with 1 tablespoon water, swirling the pan (do not stir) until it turns a deep amber, about 4 minutes. Immediately add 2 tablespoons warm water off the heat, swirl to dissolve, and set aside to cool.
- Marinate the pork. In a bowl, combine the minced pork shoulder with half of the minced shallots, half of the minced garlic, 2 tablespoons fish sauce, 1 tablespoon sugar, 1 teaspoon black pepper, 1 tablespoon vegetable oil, and 1 tablespoon of the cooled caramel. Mix vigorously in one direction for 2 minutes until tacky and springy. In a separate bowl, toss the pork belly slices with the remaining shallots and garlic, 1 tablespoon fish sauce, 1 tablespoon sugar, the remaining 1/2 teaspoon black pepper, and the remaining caramel. Cover both and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes, ideally 2 hours.
- Pickle the papaya and carrot. Toss the sliced green papaya and carrot coins with 1 teaspoon salt and let sit for 10 minutes. Squeeze gently to drain excess water, then transfer to a bowl with 2 tablespoons rice vinegar and 1 tablespoon sugar. Let pickle at room temperature for at least 20 minutes.
- Build the warm dipping broth. In the same small saucepan, gently warm 1.25 cups water with the remaining 2 tablespoons sugar and 2 tablespoons fish sauce until the sugar dissolves, about 2 minutes. Do not boil. Remove from heat and stir in the remaining 1 tablespoon rice vinegar, the lime juice, the remaining minced garlic, and the sliced chilies. Taste and balance, it should read salty, sweet, and gently sour, with a soft warmth, not hot.
- Build the charcoal fire. Light a chimney of charcoal and let it burn down until the coals glow red and are covered in white ash, about 20 minutes. Spread them in a single layer for high direct heat.
- Shape the patties. With damp hands, divide the pork shoulder mixture into 12 small balls and flatten each into a patty about 2 inches wide and 1/3 inch thick. Thread the pork belly slices loosely onto skewers in a wavy pattern, or lay them directly on the grate.
- Grill the pork. Place the patties on the hottest part of the grate and cook for 3 to 4 minutes per side, until the edges are charred and lacquered and the centers are just cooked through. Grill the pork belly slices for 2 to 3 minutes per side, until the fat is rendered, the edges crisp, and the meat caramelized. Work in batches if needed and keep the grilled pork warm.
- Warm the dipping bowls. Briefly rewarm the dipping broth if it has cooled (it should be warm to the touch, not hot). Divide it among 4 wide shallow bowls. Spoon a generous portion of the pickled papaya and carrot into each bowl.
- Assemble and serve. Drop the hot grilled patties and belly slices directly into the warm dipping bowls so the meat juices bleed into the broth. Serve immediately with the rice vermicelli on a separate plate at room temperature and a large platter of lettuce, perilla, Vietnamese balm, mint, and cilantro. To eat, each diner takes a small clump of noodles and a few herbs, dips them into the bowl of pork and broth, and pulls each bite together by hand.