Bún chả cá Đà Nẵng

Đà Nẵng, and Quy Nhơn beside it

Bún chả cá, rice vermicelli in a clear orange broth with tomato, pineapple, squash and cabbage under slices of fried fish cake: a deep bowl of fine white rice vermicelli in a clear orange tinted broth with wedges of tomato, pieces of pineapple, chunks of pale squash and cabbage.

Illustration

Time: 1 hour 30

Researched: Researched from 50 sources in the brief

The fish cake noodle soup of the central coast, in three towns, Đà Nẵng, Quy Nhơn and Nha Trang, which the shops in each call their own. The broth is sweet and sour from pineapple and tomato; the cake is mackerel in Đà Nẵng and mackerel and grouper in Quy Nhơn. The method here is a recipe page's and a cook's on VnExpress, and no source gives the dish a history.

As tradition built it

Serves a table. About 1½ hours.

Ingredients

The tradition's method, with the ingredients named. Quantities follow as we verify them.

mackerel head and bones
pork bones
2 litres water
3 tomatoes, diced
for frying oil, for the tomatoes
1 pineapple, in pieces
½ small squash, in chunks
cabbage, in chunks
dried bamboo shoots, soaked
2 tbsp fish sauce
2 tsp sugar
½ tsp salt
fish cake, chả cá, fried or steamed, sliced
rice vermicelli, bún
to serve spring onion
to serve coriander
to serve chilli
to serve lime

Method

Blanch the fish head and bones and the pork bones, then simmer them in the water for about an hour, skimming.
Fry the tomatoes about 5 minutes until soft and add them to the broth with the squash, the cabbage and the bamboo shoot.
Season with the fish sauce, sugar and salt, add the pineapple and simmer 10 to 15 minutes more.
Put blanched vermicelli in each bowl, lay the fish cake over, ladle on the broth with its vegetables, and finish with spring onion, coriander, chilli and lime.

What a modern chef changes

The cake made, the broth clear

Rung 6

Method

Make the fish cake: skinned mackerel fillet pounded or blended cold with fish sauce, sugar, pepper and a little dill, worked until it is elastic, shaped flat and fried; it is the dish, and the bought cake is a different one.
Clarify the broth with the raft of a few egg whites and the fish trimmings, so the pineapple's sweetness reads clean.
Roast the tomatoes and pineapple on the Egg before they go in, for a smoke the pot alone does not give.
Season the bowl, not the pot: fish sauce at the table, by the eater.

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