Vietnamese BBQ Pork Sausages - Nem Nuong Recipe

Let's make Vietnamese grilled sausages. Well, sausages. Sausages. Why did I say it like that? Let's make Vietnamese grilled sausages. If only you can smell this right now. Oh, do you see that steam? That is so good. I love the bouncy texture of nem nuong. It's really unique from any other grilled meats. It's savory. There's slight sweetness to it. Incredible umami from that fish sauce. Honestly, you could just serve them like this. But we're not because we need our veggies and our carbs. These grilled sausages are so versatile. You can put them in a fresh roll, put it in a bowl of vermicelli. You gotta add this to your summer grilling repertoire. And it's so easy to make. You're gonna love it. Let's prepare our mise en place. Roughly chop some shallots. Cut up your fat trimmings into small pieces. We'll be tossing this into a food processor later. We're making annatto seed oil to simply add some orangy red color to the meat. Omitting this ingredient will not impact the taste at all. So feel free to skip this step if you don't have annatto seeds or powder on hand. We're about to get a little messy here. So let me pop my apron on. In order for us to achieve that smooth paste-like texture, you're gonna need your meat to be partially frozen. I bought these fresh today and then popped them in the freezer for a couple of hours. I have two types of meat here. We have regular ground pork here and then I have some fattier bits. But you can use pork belly. I'm using pork side today. The more fat, better, tastier, more flavors. Now into the blender, we're gonna add our pork bits. If you think your meat is not frozen enough, feel free to add some cubes of ice in there. That'll definitely help the process along. Okay, put your fatty bits in there. And then we're gonna put chopped shallots, some garlic powder, sugar. The secret ingredient to a lot of my dishes is chicken bouillon. It's a great flavor enhancer. My mom used to put it in everything she made. Some cornstarch to kind of hold everything together. We're trying to get that bouncy texture. You're gonna want to put a little bit of baking powder in there. The annatto seed oil that we made earlier. This is what is going to give it its iconic color. And then I'm going to put a little bit of extra oil. All right, time to blend everything together. Oh wait, we almost forgot our most important ingredient. Fish sauce. Now we are ready to blend everything together. We forgot a little bit of pepper. Give that another blip. Let's see what we got here. Okay, looking good. Okay, it should kind of look a little gross. It's kind of like a gum texture. If that creeps you out, just try to see past it. And know that you're just gonna end up eating something really delicious in the end. Just trust the process. Let me show you what I got so far. It looks like a paste like this. Pretty stiff. You know when you go to Dairy Queen and they're like, we blended up your blizzard. Look. Same, same, same. Like it should not be liquidy, it should be pretty solid. But don't do that at home in case it will fall. Do as I say, not as I do. Is that the same? Anywho, now we're gonna form our sausages. A little tip for you for forming these sausages. I always like to have like a bowl of water on the side and just kind of wet your hands. Wet your hand in this case. One hand. So I'm just going to eyeball this. What you're gonna do is just kind of grab the ball. Start forming the paste around the skewer. We are not going for perfection here. Just kind of use your gut. Cooking for me is all about your gut feeling. I cook with the heart. I cook with the gut. Rarely do I ever measure anything. I just take note of measurements for the sake of being able to share these recipes with all of you. This is what you should get in the end. A sausage looking thing on a stick. Okay? Now form the rest of them. Dip your hands in. Grab some of the meat. Okay, I actually changed my mind. I want to make them kind of long and skinny. You can make them short and fat if you'd like, depending on your preference. But I like mine long and skinny. No, actually, I actually like the look of them better. Oh boy, so naughty. We're gonna prep all of our fresh veggies like lettuce, some cucumber, mint leaves. Can't forget your mint leaves. That is like the most important herb in my opinion. I'm gonna give it a rough chop. We want all of our fresh veggies and our cooked noodles ready to go. I always like to make a huge batch of pickled carrots and dipping fish sauce. I'm actually running a little low. Need to replenish this soon. With Vietnamese cuisines, you're always going to need these two condiments. They're the most important condiments, especially during the summer. I'm always making rice noodle bowls like some sort of bông dish. Bông is noodles in Vietnamese. Check out my YouTube shorts on how to make each of these condiments. If you want to set yourself up for success, you're going to want to make these condiments ahead of time. Let's take these to the grill. We're going to grill these skewers for five minutes on each side, a total of 10 minutes at 400 Fahrenheit. Look at, look at those. So good. If only you can smell this right now. Oh, do you see that steam? That is so good. Oh my gosh. That fat gives it that extra juiciness. That is so good. I'll be preparing these sausages two ways today. This first dish is called nem nuong cuon, Vietnamese sausage fresh rolls. Wet some rice paper, add vermicelli noodles, lettuce, fresh herbs, a piece of that grilled sausage, pickled carrots, cucumber, and fried shallots for some crunch. Wrap that up and voila. This mango sauce smells so good. Here we go. This mango sauce is not authentic. You will see out in the wild. There's another sauce that folks like to make. It has shrimp heads, pork fat, blended with other seasonings and sauces. I decided to make my own meatless yellow sauce just because I was craving for something fresh, sweet, a little fruity. So I thought mangoes are in season. I wanted something nutty. Decided to put something of my own together. This is mango, peanut butter, fish sauce, sambal, chili sauce, cilantro, lime juice to really brighten up the sauce, and a little bit of honey for that extra sweetness. Like that sweetness and the fruitiness is really balancing out the saltiness of the sausage. The second dish is called bom nem nuong, which is a vermicelli bowl with grilled sausage, lettuce, fresh mint leaves, pickled carrots and daikon, crushed peanuts, and dipping fish sauce. So good. Here, try my mango sauce. You know you want some. This is my memoir. It's good, right? That sausage is delicious. You heard it here. If you enjoyed this recipe, give this video a thumbs up. 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