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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Featured Recipe: Sichuan Cucumber Pickles

These quick pickles need to sit in vinegar for only a few hours before you can eat them. They're great with fried items, since the inegar acts as a sort of palate cleanser. But the ginger, Sichuan peppercorns, and sambal oelek—a prepared red chile paste that is readily available at most grocery stores—make them different than the standard cucumber pickle.

1 pound English cucumbers, halved lengthwise and cut on the diagonal into -inch-thick slices
2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 (1-inch) piece fresh ginger, peeled and finely julienned
1 to 2 fresh Thai chiles, stemmed, seeded, and julienned
4 cups rice vinegar
1¼ cups sugar
1½ teaspoons sambal chile paste, also known as sambal oelek
½ cup toasted sesame oil
1 tablespoon Sichuan peppercorns
¼ cup whole dried red chiles, such as árbol

In a bowl, toss together the cucumber slices and 1 teaspoon of the salt. Transfer the cucumbers to a colander and let drain in the sink for 2 hours.

Rinse the cucumbers briefly under cold running water and drain well. Transfer to a bowl, add the ginger and fresh Thai chiles, and toss to mix. In a separate bowl, stir together the vinegar, sugar, sambal, and the remaining 2 tablespoons salt until the sugar and salt have dissolved. Set aside.

In a small frying pan, heat the sesame oil over medium heat. Add the Sichuan peppercorns and toast for 10 seconds. Add the dried chiles and toast for 10 seconds longer, until the chiles darken slightly.

Pour the contents of the frying pan over the cucumbers, then add the vinegar solution and toss well. Let cool to room temperature, then cover and refrigerate. The pickles are ready to eat in 2 hours. They will keep, refrigerated, for up to 1 week.

Review

Winner, IACP Awards 2013-Chefs and Restaurants

Charles Phan’s Vietnamese Home Cooking captures the very heart of Vietnamese food: fresh, pure, full of life, and vibrant with flavor. His beautiful pictures, stories, and recipes make it completely irresistible.
—Alice Waters, chef, author, and proprietor of Chez Panisse

The great appeal of Charles Phan’s cooking at The Slanted Door has always been its vivid purity of flavor. It isn’t necessarily simple food, but there’s not a soupçon of trickery or gratuitous filigree involved. In his long-awaited, warmly written first cookbook, Phan reveals the secrets of his approach to the great and varied food of his native Vietnam.
—Colman Andrews, editorial director of TheDailyMeal.com

A truly magical and illuminating journey into the cooking of Vietnam, with recipes so thoroughly brilliant they will not only allow you to better understand the cuisine of that country, but they will also make you a better cook, Asian or otherwise.
—James Oseland, editor-in-chief of Saveur, author of Cradle of Flavor

Like the best cooking is, Charles Phan’s food is deceivingly complex. With this book, Charles shows you how to unravel that code and make delicious Vietnamese food at home.
—David Chang, chef/owner of Momofuku

About the Author

Charles Phan is the executive chef and owner of The Slanted Door family of restaurants, and the author of IACP award-winning book, Vietnamese Home Cooking. He received the James Beard Award for Best Chef California in 2004, and in 2011, was inducted into the James Beard Foundation’s Who’s Who of Food in America. He lives in San Francisco with his wife and their three children.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

When I was a kid, a cook would set up a green canvas army tent behind my family’s general store in Ðà Lat. He made only one dish: crispy egg noodles with seafood. I would go there frequently after school (we lived over the store) while I was waiting for my parents to finish work. I’d sit on a low stool waiting for my order, listening to the sizzle of liquid hitting the hot wok and the monsoon rains battering the tent, the air thick with the smell of browning noodles. It’s one of my first food memories.
Vietnam is full of snackers who are never far from a quick bite. Because the country is lacking in entry-level jobs, and because there is a huge market for food cooked outside the home (most home kitchens are poorly equipped or very cramped), people start their own ad hoc businesses, including food stalls. The entrepreneurial spirit drives cooks to the streets, where they master the art of making a single dish: sticky rice, banana fritters, green papaya salad. The cooks employ every technique—deep-frying in jury-rigged pots set over open fires, stir-frying in big woks over high flames, steaming in giant lidded bamboo baskets balanced atop rickety propane burners—to make snacks that are served and eaten on the spot. Even talented home cooks don’t make these dishes at home. Yes, space is at a premium, but an attitude persists too: why try to make something at home that you can so easily and cheaply purchase from someone who has perfected the recipe? Since we don’t have the luxury of a steamed-bun vendor or stand on every corner here in the United States, making these snacks at home is the only option.
Unlike the subsequent chapters in this book, which explain a single technique, the unifying element of the recipes in this chapter is that they’re some of the most popular foods that you’ll find sold from stalls in cities and small towns throughout Vietnam.
Street food offers a direct connection between the cook and the eater. Part of what makes the food so appealing is that it’s superfresh. You’re literally watching the dishes being made, start to finish, in front of your eyes. It is Vietnam’s answer to fast food, only it is far more interesting, varied, and well prepared.
Unlike a full-service restaurant, street vendors usually make only one or two items. That means they’ve spent their entire careers perfecting their recipe, customizing their equipment, sourcing the best ingredients. After trying an excellent bite from a vendor, I’ve often asked for the recipe. Not a single cook has ever given me one. The recipe, and the practiced technique, is as much a commodity as the food they’re selling you.
The three common denominators that help identify the best vendors: they’re usually stationary, serve a single dish or one ingredient prepared in a few different ways, and they’re always crowded.
In Vietnam, the foods you buy from street vendors aren’t categorized as hors d’oeuvres, appetizers, or main courses, though some items are traditionally served at certain times of the day. Rice porridge (page 20) and soup are found in the morning and are rarely eaten after lunch. Sweets stalls might open for only a few hours each evening. A soup vendor might pop up for a few hours during the morning commute, then pack up until the next day.
We serve many of the recipes in this chapter at The Slanted Door, where they’re some of the most popular items on the menu. Those favored Vietnamese street foods inspired the first dishes we served when we opened in 1995, and they have remained on the menu ever since. Some, like the fresh spring rolls (page 44), are easy. Others, like the filled rice-paper packets called (page 62), require some practice to perfect. As the Vietnamese vendors know well, mastery comes only from repetition. I think you’ll find the flavors so compelling that the labor will be worth it. Once you get the hang of a few of these recipes, you’ll probably find yourself making them a lot. Without the chaos, the heat, and the noise, it’ll never be exactly like eating on the streets of Vietnam, but the food will still be delicious.

Pickled Carrots

These quick pickles are the perfect foil for rich foods. They are often served alongside fried things and are always piled on top of meat-filled bánh mì sandwiches. If you like, use julienned daikon (see page 204) in addition to carrots.

• ¼ cup distilled white vinegar
• ¼ cup sugar
• ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
• ½ cup peeled and finely julienned carrots

Makes ½ cup

In a small bowl, combine the vinegar, sugar, and salt and stir until the sugar and salt have dissolved. Add the carrots and let stand for at least 20 minutes before serving. If not using right away, cover and refrigerate for up to a week. Drain the carrots well before before using.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Ten Speed Press
Publication date ‏ : ‎ September 25, 2012
Edition ‏ : ‎ 1st
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Print length ‏ : ‎ 256 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1607740532
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1607740537
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.2 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 8.81 x 1.1 x 10.83 inches
Best Sellers Rank: #84,365 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #7 in Vietnamese Cooking, Food & Wine
- #15 in Southeast Asian Cooking, Food & Wine
- #581 in Celebrity & TV Show Cookbooks
Customer Reviews:
531 ratings

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Jessica Battilana
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Jessica Battilana writes the "Repertoire" column for the San Francisco Chronicle and is the author of Corn, from Short Stack Editions. The coauthor of several other cookbooks, her work has appeared in Martha Stewart Living, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Gastronomica, Saveur, Sunset, and multiple editions of The Best Food Writing. A Vermont native, she lives in San Francisco with her wife and children.
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Charles Phan
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Charles Phan is the award-winning Executive Chef and Owner of San Francisco's The Slanted Door and 6 other restaurants. He is considered to be the inventor of modern Vietnamese cuisine in the United States.
Born in Da Lat, Vietnam in 1962, Charles and his family - parents and five siblings - relocated to Guam just before the fall of Saigon. They spent two years on Guam before settling in San Francisco in 1977.
Always having had a passion for food, Charles opened his first restaurant, The Slanted Door, on Valencia Street in San Francisco's Mission District in 1995. It was an immediate popular and critical success. The restaurant played a significant role in the revitalization of this vibrant area.
In 2004, the nationally acclaimed, The Slanted Door, became one of the principal tenants of San Francisco's historic Ferry Building and was instrumental in developing this landmark into one of the country's premier food destinations.
That year, he also won the James Beard Foundation award for Best Chef of California and in 2011 was inducted into the foundation's Who's Who of Food & Beverage in America.
Since then, Phan has opened six successful restaurants, all located in San Francisco, a city with a famously vibrant food scene. His enduring vision to showcase farm-fresh, locally sourced ingredients and prepare everything from scratch has kept The Slanted Door Group of restaurants on the forefront of San Francisco's dining scene.
Charles' first book, VIETNAMESE HOME COOKING, hopes to inspire readers to make interesting, fast, flavorful and healthy Vietnamese dishes in their home kitchens. The book won an IACP award in 2012.
His second cookbook, THE SLANTED DOOR, offers one hundred recipes of modern Vietnamese food, cocktail and dessert. The book comes at the right time to celebrate James Beard Award's Outstanding Restaurant in May 2014 and its 20th anniversary in November.
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Customer reviews

531 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find this cookbook to be a great introduction to Vietnamese cooking, with easy-to-follow recipes and thorough instructions. The book is visually stunning with beautiful pictures, and customers appreciate how it explains ingredients, particularly readily available local ones. They praise the information content, with one customer noting how well it describes techniques, and find the dishes mouth-watering.

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Recipes Ease of use Information content Visual quality Flavor Pictures Ingredients Instructions

67 customers mention "Recipes"58 positive9 negative

Customers praise the recipes in this cookbook, finding them fabulous and a great introduction to Vietnamese cooking, with one customer noting they are grouped by cooking style.

"...than a romance novel and this was a very enjoyable read, with excellent recipes accompanied by fascinating anecdotal information about Vietnamese..." Read more

"I love it! The recipes are great. This is my 5th Vietnamese cookbook and my favorite. Making braised pork this week!" Read more

"...There is a lot of good text in here about the recipes, and a lot of good recipes...." Read more

"I love this book! Authentic recipes, great use of seasonings. Healthy. Not bland...." Read more

29 customers mention "Ease of use"24 positive5 negative

Customers find the cookbook's recipes easy to follow, particularly noting the simple dishes and broths.

"Well known chef. Easy and quick recipe. Has all the favorites. Much cheaper than eating in Phan's restaurants. Two more words." Read more

"Interesting book....recipes are easy to follow but cooking Vietnamese food can be complicated...." Read more

"...The recipes are simple and straight to the point. Eventually, you are allowed to add your own flare to the dishes...." Read more

"Great book excellent condition and easy to follow recipes.." Read more

26 customers mention "Information content"25 positive1 negative

Customers find the cookbook informative and appreciate its simple techniques, with one customer noting it does a great job of explaining spices.

"...The glossary of terms and the color photos are very helpful understanding all of the new and interesting ingredients, and you will learn how to make..." Read more

"The book is beautiful and there is a lot of information in it. But the recipes tend toward the Chinese elements in Vietnamese cuisine...." Read more

"...with information, and I love a cookbook written to include such helpful insight, instruction and coaching...." Read more

"...Plenty of photos and good explanations." Read more

26 customers mention "Visual quality"25 positive1 negative

Customers appreciate the visual quality of the cookbook, praising its stunning pictures and beautiful presentation.

"Beautiful book. Recipes are complicated, however, with many ingredients. The Slanted Door cookbook's recipes are simpler." Read more

"...Beautiful pictures, thorough instructions and fabulous recipes throughout. Definitely my "go to" Vietnamese cookbook." Read more

"informative, beautiful and shows simple techniques in order to properly use the book for home cooking. great book and would highly recommend." Read more

"Beautiful photos and directions that are clear. Love how the book is formatted...." Read more

25 customers mention "Flavor"23 positive2 negative

Customers enjoy the flavor of the recipes, describing them as mouth-watering and not bland.

"...I've made 4 dishes so far and they have all been delicious. I mean excellent. This is one of the best cookbooks I own...." Read more

"...The recipes are delicious and the images are beautiful...." Read more

"So far so good. The recipes are tasty and easy to prepare...." Read more

"...The recipes are mouth watering and I look forward to trying them." Read more

23 customers mention "Pictures"21 positive2 negative

Customers appreciate the pictures in the cookbook, finding them great and helpful for following along with recipes. One customer mentions that the photographs bring back memories of many meals.

"Excellent....great pictures and very colorful......may not be the best for very beginners but I am looking forward to getting into his recipes......." Read more

"...It is a great book for lots of pictures to help." Read more

"...The photos are wonderful and engaging. The recipes are good and easy to follow. He doesn't used a lot of hard-to-find ingredients...." Read more

"...Plenty of photos and good explanations." Read more

18 customers mention "Ingredients"13 positive5 negative

Customers appreciate how the cookbook explains ingredients and notes that they are readily available local items, with one customer finding the pictures helpful.

"Beautiful photos and recipes easy to understand. Most ingredients are relatively easy to find especially lemon grass and fish sauce...." Read more

"...photos are very helpful understanding all of the new and interesting ingredients, and you will learn how to make amazing food." Read more

"Beautiful book. Recipes are complicated, however, with many ingredients. The Slanted Door cookbook's recipes are simpler." Read more

"...The author does a great job of explaining spices, flavors, and ingredients, and how to balances dishes and tastes...." Read more

16 customers mention "Instructions"15 positive1 negative

Customers appreciate the thorough instructions in the cookbook, with one customer noting the clear description of processes and another mentioning the correct order of steps.

"...book is a history of Vietnamese cooking with excellent recipes and instructions. Cannot wait to make these fabulous dishes." Read more

"...Great pictures and cooking instructions are easy to follow." Read more

"This book has great pictures, and clear description of processes...." Read more

"...It is plainly written, instructions are very detailed and easy to follow...." Read more

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Top reviews from the United States

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Kuniyoshi MD
Phenomenal
Reviewed in the United States on April 1, 2013
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

I've been going to SF's Slanted Door for many years, and was very excited to buy this cookbook. I was not disappointed. Not only are the recipes well-written and easy to understand, they are DELICIOUS and fun to make. The photos and commentary on each dish are also fantastic.

So far I have made both chicken and beef pho recipes from scratch, the latter being more difficult and time consuming due to all of the spices and beef bones involved. The Chicken Pho recipe has become a family favorite and we make it frequently.

Every other recipe we've made, such as the fried rice, has been easy to make and delicious. I am so happy that I bought this book and recommend it to anyone who wants an excellent vietnamese cookbook that really focuses on simplicity and home cooking. Well done, Charlie Phan!! Bravo!!

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I Do The Speed Limit
A wealth of information in this great Vietnamese cookbook
Reviewed in the United States on October 9, 2012
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
If you feel a bit overwhelmed when you venture into an Asian market and would like to change that feeling, this book will be immensely helpful to you. The book is overflowing with information, and I love a cookbook written to include such helpful insight, instruction and coaching.

I am a sponge for new cooking techniques and new ingredients. I was born in the U. S. and my first language is English. I'm of Polish decent. I've been interested in Asian cooking for about four years now. I cook all kinds of dishes, but we really love fresh fish, oriental greens and the unique flavors found in Asian recipes. We love the simplicity of the dishes and we love the contrasts of salty, sweet, tangy and good Texas jasmine rice. Our winter garden is currently full--really full--of Asian greens and veggies. And with that said: I think this is a great cookbook. I've used it over and over again--in just the short few months I've owned it.

So, while I can't speak for someone born in Vietnam and relocated here and I can't speak for someone who has a Vietnamese Grandmother on which to rely, I can speak for a majority of those looking at this review and wondering whether to buy this book or not: You will learn a lot from this cookbook, and you will be happy you bought it (or proud you gave it as a present). Use it as a reference book; use it for its recipes; enjoy the pictures; delight in the way the author coaxes all of your senses to blossom; take it with you to your favorite Asian grocery store and smile a lot and nod your head while you refer to it as you search out ingredients, (yes, take it with you instead of just a grocery list and spread the word.)

The author went at this cookbook venture with the intent to teach. And I'm here to say he taught me quite a lot; and thank you so much! This cookbook is not only filled with wonderful, enticing, not overwhelming recipes; it is filled with information. You will get helpful and unbiased wisdom on: Woks, ceramic pots, cleavers, grills, how to choose condiments and important ingredients, and much more.

If you are considering this cookbook and live out in the middle of nowhere, with no access to an Asian market, you may want to check this out of your library before purchase.

The recipes are divided between techniques: Steaming, frying, braising, grilling, and stir-frying; plus soup and street food. There are recipes for condiments, dipping sauces and a few pickles.

Personally, I now have precise times for steaming my whole fish; assurance that I'm grilling my whole fish in the best way possible; I have great fillings for steamed buns; I know how to prime my wok properly and for how long to let the oil heat up before adding food; I know the importance of caramel sauce, and much, much more. I've always loved a broth-y fish soup and now I have a beautiful and simple recipe using a whole fish--and I already know I will turn to it often. Because I personally zone in on whole fish in this paragraph, don't let me mislead you into thinking this is a seafood cookbook; it's really encompassing and covers beef, pork, other seafood, rice, noodles and veggies.

It's got beautiful pictures; easy-to-read and easy-to-understand ingredient lists and concise directions; a terrific glossary; an adequate index, plus it is a bound, hard-covered book, with pages made of quality paper.

The author mentions his family and his restaurants frequently, but those mentions don't seem overpowering, they just add to the charm of the writing.

Not that I'm ready to compare it with other Asian cookbooks, I can already say that this is more of a hands-on, take-it-and-cook-with-it book, than "Beyond the Great Wall" and "Hot Sour Salty Sweet' by Alford and Duguid. (While I love those two, they slant more towards coupling recipes with an area and therefore seem a bit travel-related and coffee-table style).

I'm very glad to have purchased this cookbook.

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beth
Home cooking with a commitment
Reviewed in the United States on November 24, 2013
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
So, I bought this book because it covers Vietnamese home cooking - not just foods from restaurants and street eating but a wider range of everyday dishes. I'm not Vietnamese so I really have no idea what I'm talking about, but my sense is that the recipes contained do cover dishes on the simpler/family-style end of the range. Phan is also American, so I do notice that he goes pretty light on the French-inspired dishes that I have seen in other experiences of Vietnamese food (pate etc.).

The positives: This is a beautiful text, nicely bound, laid out, and photographed. The ingredient guide in the back alone is like eye candy. I like the fact that it is grouped by cooking style (e.g. steaming, stir frying), and that he will go into one style of cooking or one type of food (e.g. steamed buns or clay pot) and then teach you several varieties on that. As far as I can tell this is a great book for someone who really wants to get into Vietnamese cooking as an art, understanding the cuisine as a whole rather than dabbling in a few dishes. I find his advice pretty low-key/practical, and he really walks you through certain details of e.g. how to choose a cleaver, what the difference between using a clay pot and a dutch oven might be. The conclusion is not always "buy the most expensive/task-specific equipment" which I appreciate a lot.

The negatives: I do find the book frustration-, ingredient-, and labor-intensive, so you have to commit. I wouldn't recommend buying this book if you don't have access to a good food processor, a good butcher, and a well-stocked Asian grocery store. This is also really not for someone who wants to throw together an Asian-inspired dinner in 20 minutes after getting home from work (though both the lemongrass porkchop and lemongrass chicken are great quick recipes) - for the most part this is weekend cooking for which you have to plan ahead and acquire the ingredients over several trips to the store.

I also do feel like sometimes, the recipes are not written in the most logical way (e.g. pork steamed bun says FIRST to make the dough - which must rise over 2 hrs - and THEN to make the pork - which must marinate overnight) or they actively make things harder (e.g. the sweet potato shrimp fritters instructions have you cross-hatching sweet potato sticks in the frying oil - after a while I just gave up and threw a whole clump in the oil which worked just as well). Other things really do just take a few tries to get right. I feel like these are the types of recipes where you sort of find your way after the second or third time making them and then they're pretty good - but following the steps to the letter does not seem to be the optimal way to proceed.

For people with a Western palate, I'd add: Vietnamese cooking really does use a lot of sugar and salt, and while I thought this book might cut down on those ingredients given SF's health-crazed foodies, I do still find the recipes pretty sweet and salty so you may need to adjust accordingly. Also, it is quite common to combine meat and fish in the same dish, which takes some getting used to and is worth being prepared for (since that applies to a lot of the recipes).

Overall, I really do enjoy the food that has come out of this book and I give Phan credit for what I think is a truly unique/distinct cookbook - it clearly has a lot of his personal voice/work/knowledge wrapped in and I think it covers a different segment of Vietnamese cuisine than many other cookbooks might. It's also pretty region-agnostic which is cool (since many of the recipes he seems to have collected through travels around Vietnam, so it's not along the lines of those cookbooks that just display a list of specialties from a chef's grandmother's hometown). As it's my first Vietnamese cookbook, though, I might supplement it with another volume that's a bit easier to cook along with.

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ruth
muy buen libro
Reviewed in Spain on August 11, 2016
Format: KindleVerified Purchase

es un buen libro en el que está todo muy bien explicado y estan las recetas tal cual las hacen allí

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P. Yuen
Klassische Rezepte gaaanz leicht!
Reviewed in Germany on December 26, 2013
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
Wunderschönes Buch mit einer guten Einführung in die Schwierigkeiten eines Kochs in der "Diaspora" . Die wichtigsten Klassiker der vietnamesischen Küche werden vorgestellt und deren Herstellung nachvollziehbar beschrieben. Sehr hilfreich: ein Glossar über die wichtigsten Zutaten mit Abbildungen. Da weiß man gleich, was man beim Asia-Laden kaufen muss. Allein das Lesen läßt einem schon das Wasser im Munde zusammenlaufen.
Toll!

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celeste dianne endrina
i love it
Reviewed in Australia on March 19, 2020
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
learned a lot of great recipes

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Dotty Oxford
Great book my husband has cooked some lovely food from ...
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 13, 2017
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
Great book my husband has cooked some lovely food from it. Vietnamese food so different from Chinese or Thai.

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Frederic
My goto vietnamese cookbook !
Reviewed in France on October 11, 2018
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
This has quickly become my goto book when it comes to vietnamese cuisine, i have several others (one only on pho :) )but i keep coming back here. Pictures are great and instructions crystal clear. Food is of course delicious !

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Frederic

My goto vietnamese cookbook !

Reviewed in France on October 11, 2018
This has quickly become my goto book when it comes to vietnamese cuisine, i have several others (one only on pho :) )but i keep coming back here. Pictures are great and instructions crystal clear. Food is of course delicious !

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Vietnamese Home Cooking: [A Cookbook] Hardcover – September 25, 2012

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A marvellous, deep cookbook for anyone

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5.0 out of 5 stars Phenomenal

5.0 out of 5 stars A wealth of information in this great Vietnamese cookbook

4.0 out of 5 stars Home cooking with a commitment

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5.0 out of 5 stars muy buen libro

5.0 out of 5 stars Klassische Rezepte gaaanz leicht!

5.0 out of 5 stars i love it

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book my husband has cooked some lovely food from ...

5.0 out of 5 stars My goto vietnamese cookbook !

My goto vietnamese cookbook !

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Phenomenal

A wealth of information in this great Vietnamese cookbook

Home cooking with a commitment

muy buen libro

Klassische Rezepte gaaanz leicht!

i love it

Great book my husband has cooked some lovely food from ...

My goto vietnamese cookbook !