By Victoria Stewart, Standard
Roast turkey might be the talk of the town but this Christmas it’s time to pull a cracker over a pork handbag, a prawn-stuffed rice paper roll or some egg banh cuon; thanks to a pride of Eastern chefs bringing their recipes over here, London’s pan of Vietnamese food is sizzling again.
Fresh and flourishing: Van Tran and Anh Vu of Banh Mi 11, in Broadway Market
Nahji Chu is a feisty Sydney-based entrepreneur known as “the queen of rice paper rolls”, who last week opened her first MissChu in London — a “tuck shop” with a catering business and 20-seater restaurant. In Australia, Chu, 43, owns nine of these, each serving fast, fresh and healthy Vietnamese grub. Starting with an Aldgate East outpost — chosen partly for its proximity to the City — she believes MissChu can be as popular here as Pret A Manger: “It was always a dream of mine to take MissChu international and London was my first choice because of Pret.
“The property [prices] and rents are very high … but the opportunities are limitless because of the sheer size of the population and the many villages London has to offer.” All being well, she will open more stores in 2014.
The MissChu menu consists of the famous rice paper rolls, pho — a restorative noodle soup made with herbs and meat — fragrant vermicelli salads and banh xeo, a Vietnamese pancake filled with bean sprouts. All can be ordered online for office delivery and takeaway or eaten inside.
Meanwhile, Monday marks the opening of Soho’s House of Ho, a 90-seater restaurant run by the Hanoi-based superstar TV chef Bobby Chinn. Here he will cook smoked pork belly in caramel sauce, Vietnamese curries and his speciality, a sous vide egg banh cuon — an eggy rice flour pancake stuffed with pork mince and wood ear mushrooms — which took him 15 years to create.
Read the full article by Victoria Stewart from Standard.
