Today marks the fate of many lemons, eggs, flour and sprinkling of sugar - it is Pancake Day!
If you'd like something a bit different, or indeed a savoury accompaniment to the French or American classic, John has shared his recipe for a crispy "country" style Vietnamese pancake.
Country Pancake with Pork and Shrimp (Banh Xeo)
Makes 2 servings
- 5 tablespoons rice flour
- 2 teaspoons turmeric powder
- 6-8 tablespoons water
- 1 bunch bean sprouts
- 1 bunch sweet basil
- 1 bunch garden mint
- handful spring onion
- handful precooked shrimp
- handful precooked pork e.g. shoulder, shredded
- chilli lime dipping sauce
Combine rice flour, turmeric and salt in a small bowl. Add water in tablespoon increments until batter is the consistency of double cream or crepe batter.
Heat 1 tablespoon of light oil and spring onion in a non-stick pan over medium-high heat until spring onion has softened. Add pancake batter, swirling to coat bottom of pan. Distribute shrimp and pork evenly over pancake batter. Heat through until pancake is crisp on bottom, top is dry, and pork and shrimp are heated through.
Turn pancake out onto serving plate, fill with desired fresh ingredients (bean sprouts, sweet basil, fresh mint) and fold over in half. Drizzle with chilli lime dipping sauce.
As with any other pancake you can fill with whichever ingredients you like if you don’t have shrimp or pork to hand or prefer other flavours.
Feel free to share your experiences with us on Facebook and twitter, we'd love to see what flavour combinations you create!
To see a similar version sizzling away, here's Thuy's video from her time in our kitchen filmed by Rampage Studio, if you want to taste before your try at home, you can eat some in person at The Little Viet Kitchen.