A fresh salad, perfect for lunch and dinner.
Vietnamese Salad with Lemongrass Beef is one of my favourite Vietnamese dishes, If we ever go out for Vietnamese, I make sure to order a salad. This is an absolute treat, it’s fresh, filling, full of exciting flavours and textures. This Vietnamese Salad with Lemongrass Beef, has everything. It has vermicelli noodles, carrots, cucumber, bean sprouts, lettuce, mint, Thai basil, coriander, chilli, crunchy fried shallots and your favourite meat topping. It’s like a flavour explosion in your mouth. Crunchy from the pickled vegetables and fried shallots and chewy from the vermicelli noodles. Not only is this salad amazing to eat, it is also super refreshing. Vietnamese Salad with Lemongrass Beef is perfect for a hot summer day.
Vietnamese salad with Lemongrass Beef
Ingredients
Lemongrass Beef
- 500 g beef
- 2 tbsp lemon grass paste
- 2 tbsp fish sauce
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 1 tbsp oil
Salad Dressing - Nouc Cham:
- 1/4 cup fish sauce
- 1/2 cup water
- 1 lime juice
- 2 tbsp sugar
- 1 chilli sliced
- 1 tbsp rice vinegar
- 1 clove garlic minced
Salad:
- 1 packet vermicelli noodles
- 1 lettuce sliced
- 2 large carrots julienned
- 300 g bean sprouts
- 1 cucumber julienned
- coriander
- mint
- thai basil
- peanuts
- fried shallots
- chillies sliced
Instructions
- Marinate your beef and set aside. Add all the marinade ingredients into a bowl and mix. Put beef in the fridge and start preparing your vegetables.
- Prepare all your vegetables. Julienne your carrots and cucumber, cut the lettuce into thin slices and wash the bean sprouts. Place all vegetables in separate bowls so it’s easier to plate up at the end.
- Prepare the noodles (following the packet instructions). Once cooked, strain and run cold water through the noodles.
- By now, you should be ready to cook the beef. Cook the pork on a hot pan (I cooked mine on the BBQ).
- Plate up. First, put a serving of noodles and a bit of the dressing on the noodles, then place your vegetables, beef and herbs. Finally, add fried shallots and dressing.
Notes
VIETNAMESE SALAD TIPS:
- For better flavour, marinate meat for up to 3 hours.
- If you intend to meal-prep this dish, make sure you keep the salad dressing separate.
- If possible, use Vietnamese mint and coriander.
- Removing the hulls from the bean sprouts keeps the sprouts fresher for a longer period of time.
- Vietnamese sweet chilli sauce goes great with this dish.
- If possible, grill the beef instead of pan frying. Grilling will give it a more intense flavour.
VIETNAMESE SALAD WITH LEMONGRASS Beef
The beef in this dish is the centre of attention, so you want to make sure it is prepared properly. For extra flavour, marinate the beef for up to 3 hours. This way the beef will soak up all the delicious flavours of the marinade. For this dish, I have used pre-minced lemongrass, though, using fresh lemongrass would yield far better results. As I stated above, if you can char-grill your beef, definitely do it! For convenience, I have cooked mine on the BBQ. If you cook it on the pan, make sure the pan is very hot and don’t be afraid of burning.
Preparing the bowl. The first layer is noodles. Cook the noodles (following the packet instructions). Rinse with cold water and drizzle with some oil to avoid potential sticking. Add the carrots and the bean sprouts. Then, add the sliced lettuce, top with mint, coriander and chillies.
Finally, add the main part of the dish, the beef. Top off with more chillies and fried shallots. If this dish is for your weekly lunches, don’t add the Nouc Cham just yet. Only add the salad dressing when you are ready to eat this delicious dish.