Pork spring rolls (Cha gio)

Makes 30 to 35 rolls

Adapted from Woks of Life

These are similar to the vegetarian spring rolls we made earlier in the year but this time with pork mince, which is the traditional way of making these Vietnamese spring rolls. I also tried these with using rice paper roll wrappers rather than regular spring roll wrappers and they are super delicious and definitely pretty close to what you get at the restaurant! They do need to be deep-fried (or at least shallow-fried) though so this is more time consuming and less healthy, and also not able to be frozen (I think). The original recipe actually says double fried but who has time for that? Anyhow, last few times I've made spring rolls I just did half vegetarian and half pork, so we ate these ones on the day and the rest were frozen so it felt like it was worth the effort!

Prep time: 60 to 90 minutes

Cooking time: 30 to 60 minutes (depending if you're cooking all of them or just enough for a meal)

Ingredients

100 g dried mung bean noodles
30 g (1/3 cup) wood ear mushrooms, sliced
5 shiitake mushrooms (20g dried, 100g rehydrated)
4 medium carrots (500 g), grated
400 g (1 cup) cabbage, grated
4 stems shallots
3 cloves garlic
2 tsp ginger
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground white pepper
2 tsp sugar

1 kg pork mince

1 Tbsp fish sauce

1 egg

Method

1. Soak the dried mung bean noodles in warm water (submerge them completely) for 30 minutes. Drain and dry with a paper towel, and cut into ¼ inch pieces. 
2. Soak the wood ear and shiitake mushrooms for 30 minutes in warm water. Drain and thinly slice.

3. Finely shred the carrot and cabbage with a food processor, or by hand.

4. Finely dice the garlic, ginger and shallots.

5. In a large frypan on medium heat, fry the garlic, ginger, carrots, cabbage, wood ear, shiitake mushrooms and shallots. Add in the soy sauce, salt, pepper and sugar until soft. Cool then place in a tea towel to wring dry. 

6. In a large bowl combine the pork mince, mung bean noodles and the vegetable mixture. Add in the fish sauce and egg and stir to combine.

7. To wrap, use the Vietnamese rice paper roll wrappers by quickly dipping in hot water then place on a large plate. Fill with 2 tablespoons of mixture then fold the bottom up to cover the mixture. Take care to remove any air bubbles. Fold both sides in then roll all the way up.

Folding bottom up, then two sides in, then roll the rest of the way up

Finished product by my little 4 y.o. (left) and me (right)

Refrigerate for at least one hour before frying to dry out the rolls.

If freezing, then use the regular spring roll wrappers.

8. To fry, heat a pan with 2cm of vegetable oil. Shallow fry the spring rolls in small batches, about 3 at a time. Make sure they do not touch just after they are placed in the oil as the skins will be sticky until a crust forms. Cook each batch for 5 to 6 minutes, or until light golden brown. (Frying them in small batches prevents them from sticking to each other.)

9. Serve with a vermicelli salad, cucumber, pickled carrots and fresh lettuce and nuoc cham sauce.