Setting the Table
When I cook an elaborate meal, I also like to set a beautiful table on which to serve it. I like to dress the table with a colorful cloth, my favorite being a floral sarong topped with a smaller scarf or a simple white cloth. I cut flowers and foliage from the garden, whatever’s in season, and I always try to be creative with the garnishes for each plate. For my Vietnamese dinner, I want to focus on a simple, elegant presentation, using components of my fresh ingredients for the garnishes.

For Asian food, I have lots of little dishes of various sizes and patterns for condiments and small courses. I also have four shallow rectangular dishes that can be used for appetizers and composed salads. For the entrée, I like to use plain white dinner plates. And I have the perfect little parfait glasses to serve the papaya sorbet. But I may make a trip to the thrift shop just to see if they have anything interesting in the way of serving dishes.
12:04 AM PDT Permalink |

About green papayas
According to The Asian Grocery Demystified, green papayas are called muk qwa, or mu gua, and are simply the hard, unripe version of the yellow-green fruits commonly found in most grocery stores. Instead of luscious deep pink flesh and pearly black seeds inside, the flesh of the green papaya is pale green with tiny white seeds. Firm green papayas should be peeled and grated or shredded for salads and relishes. There are several varieties of papayas to be found in produce markets and grocery stores, however, true 'green' papayas are rarely available anywhere except Asian markets.
02:38 AM PDT Permalink |

A Culinary Bonanza!
My mail-order ingredients arrived today, just four days after I placed my order on AsianFoodGrocer.com. They arrived in a giant box, with several smaller boxes nestled inside, and it felt just like Christmas, as I opened each meticulously packed item. The breakable bottles were protected with a generous layer of bubble wrap, and the non-breakables were wrapped in paper and cushioned with styro nuggets. I don’t know how they do it. Twenty-nine items at bargain basement prices, free shipping, and enough packing materials to build a small fort, all for less than $60. Most impressive.
12:23 AM PDT Permalink |

About Vietnamese cuisine
Although Vietnamese cuisine is unique, it has evolved over many centuries from Chinese, Indian and French Colonial influences. Vietnam is also distinctly regional, from the cooler northern region, the rich cultural Hue region in the center, and the tropical southern region, each with its own indigenous vegetables, seafood and wildlife, each with its own style and spice. Northern cuisine is lighter and less pungent, the cuisine of the central Hue region, once the site of the ancient capital, is flavorful and elaborate, while the southern region falls under the influence of Chinese cuisine, with more pungent spices and stir-fry techniques. The southern region is also the melting pot of French and Indian influences characterized by curries and European ingredients such as bread, potatoes, asparagus, shallots, and fine herbs.

The quality of Vietnamese cuisine relies mainly on fresh ingredients lightly prepared and beautifully presented. Many classic dishes are simple variations on a couple dozen basic ingredients, including bean sauce, chicken stock, coconut milk, fish sauce known as nuoc mam, 5-spice powder, ginger, ground chili paste, hoisin sauce, jasmine rice, kafir lime leaves, lemongrass, mung bean sprouts, mushrooms, oyster sauce, rice noodles, rice paper and tamarind.

The preparation of Vietnamese cuisine requires remarkably few utensils. Most any Vietnamese meal can be made using only a mortar and pestle, a rice cooker, a wok, a small charcoal stove, a basic set of chef’s knives and a large pair of chopsticks. The most common cooking methods are braising, stir-frying, deep frying, steaming and grilling.
12:25 AM PDT Permalink |

The Scent of Green Papaya
The Scent of Green Papaya, known in French as L’odeur de la Papaye Verte, and in Vietnamese as Mui Du Du Xanh, tells the 1940’s story of a young orphan girl named Mui, who goes to work as a domestic servant in the troubled household of merchant family. The day-to-day activities are seen in minute detail through the eyes of Mui, and over time, the child becomes like a daughter. But when the family falls upon hard times, Mui is sent to work in the home of a successful and sophisticated musician who was once the childhood playmate of her former employer’s son. Now grown into a stunning young woman, it is only a matter of time before her new employer recognizes the beauty before him. The Scent of Green Papaya was directed by Anh Hung Tran, whose other films include Cyclo (Xich Lo, 1995) and Vertical Ray of the Sun (Mua He Chieu Thang Dung, 2000). The film stars Tran Nu Yen-Khe, born in 1968 in Anxiuan, Vietnam, who also starred in Cyclo (Xich Lo, 1995) and Vertical Ray of the Sun (Mua He Chieu Thang Dung, 2000).

I’ve already seen The Scent of Green Papaya, but can’t wait to watch it again, especially over a fabulous Vietnamese dinner.
01:22 AM PDT Permalink |

A little background info on Vietnamese history & culture
The history of Vietnam is long and culturally varied, with colonialism playing a major role in the country’s development. Its earliest beginnings are centered around a lineage of legendary kings who inhabited the Red River Valley in a kingdom known as Au Lac. Under the rule of Kinh Duong Vuong the upper kingdom spread north to the Blue river; South to what would later become Hue, west to Sseutch'ouan, and east to the sea, while the lower kingdom under the rule of the Bang dynasty occupied Tonquin and the North-Central region. The first recorded history began in 257 BC with the reign of An Duong Vuong (257-208 BC). Chinese general Tch'ao To (Trieu Da) reigned over the Nan-yue (Nam Viet) kingdom and founded the Trieu dynasty.

In 111 BC, under the rule of the Han Dynasty, China conquered the northern part of present-day Vietnam, and later changed the name of the region to Annam. The Chinese language and alphabet, and the ideology of Confucianism were introduced, along with many elements of Chinese culture such as music, art, and architecture. The new regime was met with great resistance, the most notable of which was the revolt of 39 AD when two sisters, both widows of Vietnamese aristocrats, led an uprising. The elder sister, Trung Trac even ruled over an independent state, but was vanquished by the Chinese in 43 AD.

The Vietnamese people continued to revolt against Chinese rule, until the year 939, when Vietnamese forces under the leadership of Ngo Quyen defeated the Chinese occupation and declared itself an independent state. By the 11th century, the Ly dynasty was established, and ruled for more than 200 years. And although the Chinese influence had left its thumbprint on the country, during that time, the Vietnamese culture flourished once again, with a reaffirmation of its legendary heroes. The economy remained primarily agrarian, with the land divided among the nobility into a feudal system.

The Ly Dynasty was succeeded by the Tran Dynasty, which lasted from 1225 to 1400. However, China continued its attempts to conquer Vietnam from the north, while the kingdom of Champa was a continual menace from the south. Vietnamese forces eventually conquered Champa and took control of the Mekong Delta with an eye toward conquering the bordering nation of Cambodia.

Le Loi ascended the throne as the first emperor of the Le dynasty, which lasted for about 100 years. But its power began to decline in the 16th century, when the court was divided by two rival families, the Trinh and the Nguyen. The nation was subsequently divided, with the southern region awarded to the Nguyen family.

By the 18th century, European explorers and merchants had already begun to infiltrate Southeast Asia, and French missionaries began getting involved in local politics when French missionary Pierre Pigneau de Behaine raised a mercenary army to help Nguyen Anh seize the throne, with Pigneau's motive being to gain trade and missionary access to Vietnam. When the new government did not fulfill those hopes and began persecuting existing missionaries in Vietnam, Emperor Napoleon III launched a naval action in 1858, forcing the imperial court to accept a French colonial protectorate.

Although there was tension and resentment among the Vietnamese people, the French occupation of Vietnam was met with little resistance. Throughout the 19th century, the French brought about many economic improvements, however the working class suffered from low wages and poor living conditions. By the turn of the 20th century, reformist parties had begun to form, and in 1930, Ho Chi Minh formed the Indochinese Communist party.

During World War II, Japan placed Vietnam under military occupation, which limited the power of the French colonial rulers. During this time, the Communist Party also organized the League for the Independence of Vietnam, known as The Vietminh. When Japan surrendered to Allied Forces in 1945, the Vietminh rose up and declared an independent republic in Hanoi. They were met with strong resistance from Emperor Bao Dai of the Nguyen Dynasty, in alliance with the French, who together drove the Vietminh forces north. After a year of failed negotiations, a war erupted that lasted for almost eight years. In a decisive battle at the French fortress of Dien Bien Phu in 1954, the Vietminh emerged victorious, bringing about a surrender on the part of the French and South Vietnamese forces. A treaty was drafted in Geneva, dividing Vietnam at the 17th parallel. A clause in the treaty made provisions for a national election in 1956 to reunify the country.

In the north, the Communist Party continued to grow in power, while in the Saigon, to the south, a new anti-Communist regime was led by President Ngo Dinh Diem. When Diem refused to hold elections prescribed by the treaty, and attempted to subdue Communist influences in the south, the U.S. offered diplomatic support. However, his political policies were not popular among the people of South Vietnam, and in late 1963, Diem was overthrown by members of his own army.

Fearing an opportunity for Communist North Vietnamese forces to prevail, U.S. President Lyndon Johnson sanctioned the bombing of North Vietnam and the placement of U.S. troops in South Vietnam. The Vietnam conflict continued throughout the remainder of Johnson’s administration and into the presidency of Richard Nixon. Ho Chi Minh died in 1969 and was succeeded by Le Duan. Growing futility in the Vietnam conflict, and vociferous anti-war protests on the domestic front brought about the gradual withdrawal of U.S. troops throughout the early 1970’s. By 1973, a peace treaty had been drafted, which provided for the withdrawal of all U.S. troops and an agreement for Vietnam to hold national elections.

The treaty did not last however, and in 1975, the Communists launched a renewed military offensive. The Thieu regime in the south collapsed within six weeks, and on April 30, 1975 the Communists seized power in Saigon, renaming it Ho Chi Minh City. In 1976, the South was reunited with the North in the new Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

Conflict continued with the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in 1979, in which the Khmer Rouge government was replaced by a pro-Vietnamese government. Throughout the 1980’s, Vietnam stationed troops in both Cambodia and Laos, most of which had been removed by the end of the decade. The post-war economy was unstable for several years thereafter, however economic reforms, including the removal of government price controls and trade embargos, the allowance of private enterprise and foreign investment, and the re-establishment of international diplomatic relations has led to the eventual recovery of Vietnam as a flourishing, independent Asian nation.
12:10 AM PDT Permalink |

Tracking down exotic ingredients
Today I went shopping in Napa for some of the specialty ingredients that I will need to prepare a Vietnamese dinner. I started at our local Trader Joe’s, but didn’t get nearly as lucky as I’d hoped. I was only able to find cellophane noodles, fish broth, jasmine rice, and orange roughy filets for my Hanoi Yellow Fish Nuggets. Afterwards, I went to Napa’s best gourmet grocery store looking for the remaining items, but did not find any of the other Asian ingredients I needed. I thought about trying the health food store next door, where, in a pinch, I can sometimes buy hard-to-find ingredients at hugely inflated prices, but by that time, it was closed, which in this case, wasn’t a bad thing.

When I got home, I logged onto the Internet in hopes of finding an online source for my missing Asian ingredients, and Eureka! After a few tries with the Yahoo search engine, I discovered AsianFoodGrocer.com, which has an amazing selection of all the basic items for most every Asian cuisine, all at bargain prices. And best of all, shipping is free on orders of $50 or more. Since all I needed to complete my Vietnamese ingredients list were nuoc mam, spring roll wrappers, and Chinese 5-spice powder, I did a little advance shopping for my next Japanese dinner, and added a few Chinese items to make up the difference. At those prices, and no shipping charges, it sure beats driving to Oakland, with gasoline at $2.50 a gallon. And hey, as an added bonus, a cute UPS guy will truck all the boxes up the stairs and deliver them to my door. What a fantastic deal!
12:05 AM PDT Permalink |

My Shopping List
Here is a list of the ingredients I will need to make all the dishes for my Vietnamese dinner:

Specialty Ingredients: Nuoc mam (Asian fish sauce), Rice Paper Wrappers, Chinese 5-Spice Powder, Lemongrass, Cellophane Noodles, Jasmine Rice, Turmeric, Rice Wine Vinegar, Sesame Oil, Fish Broth

Fresh Ingredients: Papayas (Green & Ripe), Limes, Ginger Root, Red & Green Bell Peppers, Chili Peppers, Lettuce, Bok Choy, Watercress, Cilantro, Mint, Scallions, Carrots, Cucumber, Onions, Shallot, Garlic, Mushrooms, Roasted Peanuts, Shrimp, Firm White Fish, Pork Loin, Ground Pork

Basics: Sugar, Cooking Oil, Eggs, Flour, Soy Sauce
12:13 AM PDT Permalink |

Deciding on the Dishes for a Vietnamese Dinner
Well...I'm up to my usual tricks, improvising and ad libbing instead of just following a set recipe. But looking over all these Vietnamese recipes, it's pretty clear that most dishes are made from the same basic group of a couple dozen ingredients, which are combined and prepared in various ways. So, here's what I'm thinking for my Scent of Green Papaya Dinner:

Appetizer: Vietnamese Rice Paper Spring Rolls with Shrimp

Soup: Lemongrass Broth with Seafood Dumplings

Salad: Watercress and Green Papaya Salad with Cellophane Noodles and Hanoi Fried Yellow Fish Nuggets

Main Course: Clay Pot Pork Loin with Papaya, Mint & Green Chili Relish, Stir-Fried Spring Vegetables and Garlic-Ginger Rice

Dessert: Papaya-Ginger and Mint Tea Sorbet with Ripe Papaya Slices and Fresh Mint Garnish

02:04 AM PDT Permalink |

Designing the Menu
Whenever I go to the effort of making a gourmet meal, I want everything to be perfect. I spend days planning the menu, shopping for ingredients, designing a table setting and assembling my utensils. I always like to make several smaller courses for a good representation of flavors and textures rather than one heavy main course. The only problem is that sometimes my guests and I are almost full when the main course arrives, so I have to keep the courses light and make sure we pace ourselves throughout the meal.

For my Scent of Green Papaya dinner, I’m thinking five courses: an appetizer or two, a clear soup, a noodle salad, a fish entrée accompanied by seasoned rice and fresh vegetables, and a light fruit dessert, probably something made with fresh ripe papaya. Plus nibbles & snacks, as well as a traditional beverage or two.
12:08 AM PDT Permalink |

Getting Acquainted with Vietnamese Cuisine
Okay, so I'm looking at all these Vietnamese recipes in my two cookbooks, plus a little extracurricular research on epicurious.com, and one thing is obvious. I'm definitely gonna need something called nuoc mam. Now although I may have originally given the impression that I'm a total neophyte when it comes to Vietnamese cuisine, that's not entirely true. I know what nuoc mam is.

Back in my hometown of Mobile, Alabama, I helped an ex-boyfriend open a gourmet restaurant called The Casbah, and although the menu was strictly 'continental', his #1 employee was a darling Vietnamese woman named Mai Nguyen. My ex was a Vietnam War veteran, and because he was so familiar with her culture, the two of them got along famously. Mai's story was heartbreaking (her family, one with a long and aristocratic heritage, had to flee the country in a homemade skiff with what few possessions they could carry on their backs), nevertheless, she had an amazingly buoyant spirit and an indomitable work ethic. Not only did Mai and her aged father Dan help restore the historic Mediterranean building for The Casbah restaurant, once it opened, Mai did most if not all of the daily prep and cooking for both the lunch and dinner shifts.

But when she prepared meals for herself and her family in the restaurant kitchen, she made Vietnamese food, and for that, she always kept a bottle of nuoc mam on the pantry shelf. Mai's nuoc mam was the subject of much curiosity and even a little good-natured kidding from the other staff members, who wanted no part of that strange brew.

Thanks to Mai's culinery expertise, the Casbah enjoyed a few good years in the Mobile restaurant scene, but when it finally closed, Mai had saved up enough money to open her own restaurant, The Ivory Chopstick, located in a turn-of-the-century home in the city's scenic garden district. Shortly after it opened, just a few months before I moved to California, I had the pleasure of enjoying one of the finest meals I have ever eaten: a delicate spring roll appetizer, followed by a heavenly lemongrass broth with seafood dumplings, and for the main course, pan-sauteed sole with a soy-ginger beurre blanc accompanied by a medley of perfectly steamed vegetables...Each dish lovingly and expertly prepared by the hands of Mai Nguyen.

12:06 AM PDT Permalink |

Zero-ing in on My Recipes
This evening, I sat down with Essentials of Asian Cuisine by Corinne Trang and pored through it in search of all the Vietnamese dishes it contains. The book features sections on all the various cultures, cuisines and ingredients, and the recipes are categorized by course rather than by country, so I had to read through each section to locate all the Vietnamese recipes, which aren't always specifically listed as Vietnamese in the index. (Not that I mind, however, since I got lots of ideas for next month's ThingsAsian Dinner & a Movie in the process.) So... I flagged each Vietnamese recipe with a Post-it Note, and tomorrow, when I sit down to focus on my Dinner & a Movie project again, I can easily locate all the Vietnamese recipes and get an idea of which ones sound the most appetizing, and practical, given the potential scarcity of certain ingredients in my grocery-shopping vicinity.
12:15 AM PDT Permalink |

Searching for Recipes
As a jumping off place, I have chosen two books from my kitchen cookbook shelf to help me select my Vietnamese recipes and to design a menu to complement The Scent of Green Papaya. Those two books are: Essentials of Asian Cuisine by Corinne Trang, and The Asian Grocery Demystified, by Linda Bladholm. Of course, in the process, I will probably end up doing extra research on the Internet. There are so many millions of recipes on the Internet that it's a wonder anyone even bothers to publish a cookbook anymore.

My all-time favorite cookbook is The Joy of Cooking, followed closely by The Silver Palate Cookbook and the Moosewood Cookbook. But I don't think any of those three are going to yield much in the way of classic Vietnamese dishes. So that's where the Internet may come in handy. I also have to mention that I rarely follow a recipe to the letter. I have found that there are hundreds of variations on most traditional dishes, so what I usually do is research several dozen recipes to find out which one best suits my tastes and the ingredients I have on hand, and then I usually end up improvising. Occasionally, the results are disastrous, but more often, the end result is a delicious dish that I have imbued with my own personal touch. The only problem is that I usually forget to write down exactly what I did, so I rarely make a dish the same way twice. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. But I figure as long as it's tasty, attractive, and captures the essence of the cultural cuisine, then it's all good. I like to think of cooking as a perpetual adventure, and what better way than to try something new every time.
02:37 AM PDT Permalink |

My Culinery Experience
I have a confession to make. Although I cook Japanese, Chinese, Indian, and Arabic food on a regular basis, I don't know thing one about Vietnamese food, much less how to prepare a five course Vietnamese meal. So the learning curve is going to be really steep on this culinary project. However, after years of experience in the restaurant business, I'm a passable chef, not to mention that I have enjoyed hundreds of memorable meals in some of the world's best restaurants. And besides, I'm addicted to the Food Network and sometimes stay up watching cooking shows until nearly sunrise. So... I'm not about to be intimidated by one little Vietnamese dinner menu. The biggest challenge for me, I think, is going to be finding all the requisite ingredients in the town of Napa, California, where I live. Although we have a dozen major supermarkets here in town, we do not have even one Asian grocery (although we do have a Trader Joe's), so I may have to venture pretty far afield to find all the authentic components of a traditional Vietnamese meal. Fortunately, there are several multi-cultural towns nearby, and in a pinch, I can always drive to San Francisco or Oakland if need be.
02:51 AM PDT Permalink |

Welcome to Dinner & a Movie
The three things I love most in this life are Asian culture, gourmet cooking, and classic films. So when the webmaster of ThingsAsian offered me my own weblog, there was no need for deliberation over what the theme would be:

Welcome to ThingsAsian Dinner & a Movie. In this daily weblog, throughout the course of each month, I will be sharing with our ThingsAsian readers the process of choosing a classic Asian film, selecting recipes from the country in which the film takes place, designing a menu, shopping for ingredients, setting the table, preparing the meal, enjoying it while watching the film, and finally, writing a film review.

For my inaugural ThingsAsian Dinner & a Movie, I have chosen the 1993 French-Vietnamese classic, The Scent of Green Papaya, directed by Tran Anh Hung. The story of how I first came to see The Scent of Green Papaya is an interesting one that goes all the way back to my high school days. My best friend from high school is Betty Bullock, a Japanese-American woman who is an administrator in the staff development department at the University of South Alabama Medical Center. Although we live thousands of miles apart and rarely see each other, Betty and I have kept in touch over the years, and share a love of Asian film.

Each year, I receive press copies and write reviews of all the Asian entries in San Jose's Cinequest Film Festival for the ThingsAsian website, and in 2003, the best of the batch was a Japanese film called Firefly Dreams. I was so moved by the film that I sent it to Betty for her to enjoy, with the request that she return it so that I could circulate it among my other friends as well. A few weeks later, I got an e-mail from Betty's husband Jimmy, asking whether Firefly Dreams was available for purchase. Before I could reply to tell them to keep the tape, a package from Betty arrived in the mail. Enclosed was an extremely apologetic note, explaining how one of her children had accidentally rolled over on the remote control while the videotape was in the VCR and taped over the first few seconds of the film. What Betty didn't know was that the videotape of Firefly Dreams was just a promotional copy. As a peace offering, she had also enclosed a gift of two of her favorite Asian films, one of which was The Scent of Green Papaya.

All's well that ends well, and after years of catching my eye on the shelves of the foreign film section of my local video store, thanks to my friend Betty, I finally got to see The Scent of Green Papaya. And while I wouldn't categorize it as my very favorite Asian film of all time, it is so sensuous and appetizing and redolent of Vietnamese food and culture that it seemed the perfect choice for my first ThingsAsian Dinner & a Movie weblog. So without further ado, let's make a Vietnamese dinner and watch The Scent of Green Papaya.

06:03 PM PDT Permalink |