It’s a Vietnamese pancake. But it’s so much more than just a silly pancake.
We had Banh Xeo with Brinda after our trip to the Cu Chi tunnels. The Banh Xeo “restaurant” was not a place I’d typically stop at. It was an outdoor-ish kitchen with a bunch of metal tables and chairs. I’d soon learn that this was a more “upscale” version of a typical street restaurant. Later “restaurants” would have child sized plastic furniture on the sidewalk.
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Xeo – (banh say-o) – is a pancake made from a rice based batter. Ours was filled with shrimp, pork and bean sprouts. It was light and crispy on the outside, warm and delicious on the inside. It is delivered to your table in a giant half circle – folded over on itself with the contents tucked inside the crispy pancake – along with a basket of fresh, leafy greens and herbs. This is when it gets a little tricky. You have to kind of cut up the pancake into bite sized pieces….with chopsticks. Ugh. My chopstick dexterity leaves a bit to be desired. But we managed.
To eat it, you take a leafy green in the palm of your hand, and then add a piece of the pancake to it. I added some random herbs as well. Then you roll it up like a cigar (because I totally know how to roll cigars….) and eat it!
The pancake alone would be too greasy for me. But the addition of the fresh veggies made it taste really fresh and the 3 of us downed 2 pancakes in no time!
Apparently this was a spot that Anthony Bourdain stopped at….so it’s bound to become touristy soon – but it was empty when we were there. Try it the next time you’re out for Vietnamese. Go ahead, order pho, but also try this!
