It is impossible to appreciate the deliciousness and abundance of Vietnamese food today without contrasting it with the privations the people have endured throughout the country’s long history. For Nicole Routhier, born in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) to a Vietnamese mother and French father, it sounds like at times her childhood was quite comfortable – while at other times, it was not.
In the introduction to her book The Foods of Vietnam (1989), Routhier, who now has a restaurant in Houston, Texas, in the United States, writes, “As I grew up in Vietnam and Laos, my mother insisted upon her children learning about their Vietnamese culture. Although my sister and I had a formal French education, we spoke only Vietnamese to our mother and nanny at home.
“I learned about cooking from my nanny, a native of Hue, and my mother, from Haiphong; both were home cooks of the first order. Later, my mother owned a small French-Vietnamese restaurant in Laos. When the chef let me help in the kitchen and showed me a few tricks, I knew what my true calling would be.
“Although I wasn’t fully aware of it, my obsession with food started when I was much younger. There were many times of hardship while I was growing up in Asia, especially after my father left home. During the war, food was scarce and we ate what we could. Sometimes we had to hide in the village bomb shelter for days if not weeks on end, and rice was often the only food available.
“Our nanny fed us a sort of pressed mashed rice. Each of us was allotted a few sticks of that rice at a time. Unlike my sister, I would never eat my entire ration, but instead I hid it in a very safe place where nobody could find it. Every now and then I would sneak away from my nanny and take a small bite from my treasured food. Although my young, innocent eyes viewed the episode as a game, there was also fear; I was hungry and terrified at the idea of lacking food. That childhood fear never abandoned me.”
Routhier acknowledges the influence foreign occupiers had on Vietnamese cuisine and culture. “Ten centuries of Chinese rule introduced such things as Confucianism, writing, methods of administration, art and architecture. The Chinese also contributed the custom of eating with chopsticks, the art of stir-frying and deep-frying in a wok, and food staples such as soy sauce, bean curd and noodles, among others. However, the Vietnamese, ever conscious of retaining the native character of their culture, assimilated rather than adopted Chinese cooking, leading to a distinctly different cuisine […]
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“Vietnamese gastronomy also owes a great deal to the example of France, which ruled the country for almost a century (1859-1954) […] The French implanted a passion for café au lait, French bread, milk, butter, yogurt and even ice creams […]
“As much as Vietnamese cuisine has borrowed from or been influenced by various cultures, it has succeeded in retaining its unique character.”
Routhier gives recipes for Vietnamese classics such as cha lua (smooth-textured pork sausage), stir-fried squid with pickled mustard greens, barbecued shrimp paste on sugar cane, steamed rolled ravioli, bun bo (cold rice vermicelli with salad and stir-fried beef), spicy and sour shrimp soup, roast quail, pho bac (Hanoi beef and rice-noodle soup), fried vegetarian spring rolls, grilled beef with lemongrass, banh xeo (stuffed crisp rice pancakes), fried squid and shredded cabbage and chicken salad.
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