This is a vegetarian twist of the typical pork mince or prawn filled pancake usually served in Hanoi’s street kitchens, I enjoyed a few of these on my travels and discovered this in Yotam Ottyolenghi ‘s- vegetarian cookbook ‘Plenty’ and think it is a great match for the real thing to have for lunch.
When eating vegetarian meals it is important to balance protein sources to ensure you are still getting enough without animal sources. This keeps you fuller for longer and supports muscle turnover both even more important for health when being more active.
This dish is a tasty alternative to the traditional pork version but the protein content needs to be increased. So I would recommend substituting half the rice flour in the batter with whey protein or cottage cheese or you could add tofu to the filling or have yoghurt on the side as a dipping sauce.
Get Set:
Serves 4
Pancake:
200g rice flour (or 100g rice flour + 50g whey protein or cottage cheese)
1 free range egg
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp turmeric
400ml canned coconut milk
Sauce
40ml lime juice
11/2 tbsp sesame oil
1 tsp brown sugar or honey
1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
1 tsp soy sauce
2 tsp fresh root ginger
1 red chilli
1 clove of garlic
1/2 tsp salt
Filling:
1 carrot
1 mooli
4 spring onions
1 green chilli
80g mangetout
100g mung bean sprouts
100g enoki mushrooms (can substitute with others)
chopped handful of coriander, basil and mint
Go:
Batter: Place rice flour, egg, salt, an turmeric into large bowls. Slowly add the coconut milk whisking well to avoid lumps. You want a thinnish pancake batter with the consistency of single cream. Add more coconut milk or water if needed. When you come to cook the batter check again as it can thicken when set aside to rest.
Sauce: Whisk together all the ingredients add more or less chilli to your liking.
Filling: Shred the veggies, slice the spring onions, cut the chilli and mange tout into long thin strips, pick and roughly chop the fresh herbs and mix with the mushrooms and sprouts.
Heat a large pan not too hot, use coconut oil or a dash of olive oil in the pan.
Pour in a quarter of the mix and coat the bottom of the pan, turn the heat right down and wait for it to cook, flip and cook the other side then remove from the pan. Repeat until you have used up the batter mix.
Add veg to half the pancake and drizzle some sauce in the mixture, fold over and drizzle some more sauce over the top.
Serve alone or with cooling plain yoghurt, close your eyes and imagine the hustle and bustle of a large Asian city and wash down with a pale ale if you so desire!