Some Yummy Asian Recipes!

For Father's Day, this year, I wanted to learn how to make some of my husband's favorite Asian dishes. I was SUPER nervous about it - they seem like so much would be involved! BUT, I do consider myself brave in the kitchen, and lo and behold - they turned out delicious!! YUMMO!

Because I'm such a sweet gal (hee hee) I just HAVE to share the recipes with YOU.

Chinese Spring Rolls

5 lbs carrots, peeled and grated
2 large onions, chopped fine
1 large bunch green onions (about 8) chopped fine
3 bags rice vermicelli noodles (we used rooster brand)
4 lbs ground pork, thawed
4 pkgs square spring roll wrappers (50/pkg - found in frozen foods section, looks like pastry)
8 eggs
6 egg yolks
2 Tbsp salt
1 Tbsp black pepper
2 cups oyster sauce
2 lbs bean sprouts (the large ones)
Oil for deep frying

The night before:

Soak the vermicelli noodles in a pot of hot water for about 10 minutes. Drain and leave overnight (just sitting in a bowl on the counter). You want the noodles to be fairly dry for this.

The next day:

Take out the frozen spring roll wrappers and sit them on the counter to thaw while you make the filling.

Grate the carrots, chop the onions, and green onions (I just used my food processor - worked great! AND fast!). Then you want to take handfuls of the carrots and squeeze out as much liquid as you can, then transfer to a very large bowl. Do the same with the onions. Put all of it into the large bowl.

Add the vermicelli noodles to the carrots and onions. Mix well (use your clean hands and just mix until well combined). Add the raw, thawed ground pork, and mix. Then add the 8 eggs, salt, pepper, and oyster sauce. Continue mixing until it's very well blended. The last step for the filling is to gently mix in the sprouts so they don't break up too much. You're done the filling! (this makes enough filling for about 200 rolls!) The filling will look like this:

Beat 6 egg yolks together and place in a small bowl on the table (or counter) where you will be rolling them.

(this is the brand of wrappers we bought).

Now you take the spring roll wrappers, and separate them slowly (they could tear if you are too rough with them). Layer them one on top of the other, each wrapper at a different angle than the one before (this is hard to explain, but you can see in the picture below how I did it). You will want to keep a damp cloth nearby to cover them if there is a large space between rolling them.

Take a wrapper, place it like a diamond shape in front of you, and put one heaping TBSP of filling on the corner nearest you. Spread some egg yolk on the top corner. Roll up according to package directions (roll the corner nearest you towards the far corner, tucking in the sides half way up, then continue rolling, sealing the top corner over with the egg yolk. Place them on a plate until you are ready to deep fry them. You can kind of see how they are rolled in this picture:


Heat oil in a deep fryer or a large pot on high. About 5 minutes before deep frying, turn down the heat to medium. Add 4-5 spring rolls at a time and cook for about 10 minutes, or until the wrapper starts to brown and have a transparent appearance. Remove and drain on a paper towel. ENJOY!Oooh, these were my FAVORITE! SOOO good. We froze them after deep frying them and they reheat great. I also tried freezing some BEFORE deep frying, and I'm going to try baking them. We'll see how that works out. This is super fun to do together with a friend. My friend, K (from the previous post) did these with me - in fact, she taught me how! What a great gal. We had great fun visiting while doing these. You can also quarter the recipe and only do 50 at a time, if you want to.

Korean Kimchi

For this recipe - I'm going to refer you to a how-to video that I used and it turned out PERFECT! It's a short and easy to follow video on how to make this spicy cabbage side dish. It's one of hubby's favorites and it's difficult to find here. All the more reason to learn to make it! We loved it.

We just used one whole apple instead of a half apple and a half apple-pear. It turned out great. Only took a couple of hours to make, and it was so easy. I'll be making it again!

Vietnamese Salad Rolls

These are super duper easy and we all love them! My daughter, TJ, helped to roll these and did a great job!


1 Pkg Vermicelli noodles (same as from the spring roll recipe)
3 lbs shrimp, thawed and shells/tails removed
1 lb pork deli meat (opt.)
1 bunch cilantro (opt.)
Carrots, grated
Lettuce, torn into strips
Rice wrappers (the round, kind of transparent looking ones - can find them in the Asian aisle at Superstore)

Soften noodles in a bowl of hot water for 10 minutes, drain.

Fill a large bowl with hot water. Dip one rice wrapper in the hot water for 1 second to soften. Lay wrapper flat, and place desired amounts of noodles, shrimp, pork, carrot, lettuce and cilantro in the center. Roll the edges of the wrapper slightly inward. Beginning at the bottom edge of wrapper, tightly wrap the ingredients. Repeat with remaining ingredients.

Serve with Hoisin sauce or, better yet, peanut sauce!


Peanut Sauce

1/2 cup natural-style creamy peanut butter
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons Hoisin sauce
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 small garlic clove, mashed to a paste
1 tablespoon dark sesame oil
Juice of 1 lime
1/4 cup water

Mix in a mixer until smooth. Dip your salad rolls in this (MAJOR yum!)