Northern Vietnamese Crab and Tomato Noodle Soup / Canh Bún
Canh Bún has lived in the shadows of its more famous counterpart, Bún riêu, and I think it's finally time to give it the flowers that it justly deserves.
- Prep time
- 1 hr
- Cook time
- 2 hr
- Yield
- 6 servings
- Difficulty
- MEDIUM
Ingredients
Quantities are shown as originally provided.
- 6 quarts water
- 2 lbs pork spareribs
- ½ cup dehydrated shrimp
- 1 yellow onion
- 2 cubes bún riêu/canh bún seasoning
- 7 oz crab paste with soya oil
- 3 large roma tomatoes
- 4 tbsp fish sauce
- 1 inch nub of rock sugar
- 2 tbsp msg
- 1 tbsp mắm ruốc (fermented shrimp paste)
- Salt to taste
- 1 lb lean ground pork
- 16 oz jumbo lump crab
- 7 oz crab paste with soya oil
- 3 eggs
- 1 tbsp fish sauce
- Salt and pepper to taste
- 32 oz thick rice noodles
- Chả chiên (fried vietnamese ham)
- Tofu puffs
- Rau muống (water spinach)
- Garlic chives
- Limes
- Black pepper
Instructions
- 1
Parboil pork spareribs, then rinse and clean pork under cold water
- 2
To a clean stockpot add six quarts of water and bring up to a boil, add cleaned pork, a whole yellow onion, and half a cup of rehydrated dried shrimps
- 3
Add 2 cubes of bun rieu seasoning, and just the oil from a jar of crab paste with soya oil
- 4
Bring up to a boil, skim off any impurities and let that simmer for 2 hours
- 5
Season broth with rock sugar, msg, fish sauce, and salt to taste
- 6
Make crab meatballs by combining, group pork, jumbo lump crab, the remaining crab paste, and eggs. Season with fish sauce and salt and pepper. Form loose balls with a spoon, and drop them into the stock pot
- 7
Add roma tomatoes, tofu puffs and shrimp paste to the broth
- 8
Cook thick rice noodles in heavily salted water - the brand I use has wrong cooking instructions - as it says you only need to cook for 7-8 minutes. I’ve found that I’ve needed to cook for 30-35 minutes to get to al dente
- 9
Cut water spinach into 1-2 inch sections, then in a separate pot blanch water spinach, and shock in cold water to stop the cooking process and keep them green
- 10
Thinly slice fried Vietnamese ham and cut garlic chives into one inch pieces for garnishes
- 11
Assemble your bowl by adding noodles, proteins, broth and garnishes