BANH CHUNG made easy (Vietnamese Traditional Dish)

BANH CHUNG

Banh Chung is a staple in every Vietnamese household when comes Lunar New Year. It is a sign of bringing in the New Year and just down home comforting. It is not hard to make just time consuming, which is also part of the celebration, where families sit around and enjoy the celebration by making banh chung. Its normally serves with pickled leeks, and left-over banh chung are normally fried, which by the way is my favorite way to eat banh chung.

There are only a few ingredients to this dish, which are sticky rice, mung bean, side pork and banana leaves.

STICKY RICE

MUNG BEAN

find yourself some kind of mold, I used a mooncake mold, making a smaller version of banh chung, which I find it much easier to eat and less cooking time.

Cleaning and trimming your frozen banana leaves is very important in preserving your banh chung and then your first step is laying it out as follows...

BANANA LEAVES

Then put down a layer of sticky rice, which have been soaked in salted water overnight, the ratio of rice to mung bean is 2 to 1.

STICKY RICE

then a layer of mung bean, which I cooked to a paste with a little salt.

MUNG BEAN

then the middle part is the most important since this is where the flavoring comes in. Use side pork and cut to appx third inches thick. Marinated with lots of kosher salt and fresh ground pepper, where the ratio is 2 to 1, be liberal and make it salty, since this is your only source of seasoning. I also added onion powder and chopped minced dried onions and some mushroom seasoning if available.

PORK

then add another layer of mung bean and rice to finish.

STICKY RICE

carefully packed and complete the wrapping process as follows

BANH CHUNG

BANH CHUNG

finish with a layer of aluminum foil

BANH CHUNG

put in boiling pot and cover tih water and boiled over night let rest and serve.

BANH CHUNG