Reddit mentions: The best vietnamese cooking, food & wine books

I'm a bit of a cookbook junkie, so I have a bunch to recommend. I'm interpreting this as "good cookbooks from cuisines in Asia" so there are some that are native and others that are from specific restaurants in the US, but I would consider these legit both in terms of the food and the recipes/techniques. Here are a few of my favorites:


Pan-Asian

• Asian Dumplings - the masterpiece on all things dumpling
  
• Asian American - Dale Talde's (Top Chef) book with lots of Asian cultures' food in the US
  
• Asian Pickles - pickles and fermented foods from throughout Asia
  
• Lucky Rice - recipes from the Asian festival of the same name
  
• The Asian Grandmother's Cookbook - traditional cooking passed down to American cooks
  
  Burmese
  
  
• Burma:Rivers of Flavor - good focus on difference in Burmese cuisine from other regional
  
  Cambodian
  
  
• Num Pang - Cambodian sandwich restaurant in NYC
  
• Cambodian Cooking - GREAT book on Cambodian cuisine, supporting refugees
  
  Chinese
  
  
• Ken Hom Complete Chinese Cookbook - great primer for cooking Chinese food using ingredients commonly available in US
  
• China Moon - classic SF Chinese restaurant food
  
• Feeding the Dragon - modern culinary journey through all of China
  
• Mastering the Art of Chinese Cooking - omnibus focused on the home chef
  
• Breath of a Wok - focus on wok technique at home
  
• Every Grain of Rice - wonderful Sichuan food for home cooks
  
  Indian
  
  
• Madhur Jaffrey Indian Cooking - actually, any of her cookbooks are wonderful for Indian cooking
  
• Savour Mumbai - looks at Indian cuisine as a melting pot in Mumbai
  
• The Indian Family Cookbook - modern South Indian food
  
• Indian Harvest - Vikas Khanna's family cookbook
  
• Made in India - classic Indian food, from street to home
  
  Indonesia
  
  
• The Food of Indonesia - everything you need for a rijstaffel!
  
  Japanese
  
  
• Japanese Farm Food - authentic rural Japanese cooking
  
• Preserving the Japanese Way - how to make awesome Japanese pickled vegetables
  
• Sushi Chef - not strictly speaking a cookbook, but "Jiro Dreams of Sushi" book in English
  
• The Japanese Grill - authentic hibachi and Japanese grill recipes
  
• Japanese Comfort Food - lots of traditional Japanese recipes
  
• Nanban - Japanese "soul food"
  
• Tokyo Cult Recipes - hip modern urban food from Tokyo
  
• Yum Yum Bento Boxes - updated modern take on bento boxes
  
• Ivan Ramen - traditional ramen for a Western audience
  
• Izakaya - traditional Japanese pub food & small plates
  
• Nikkei - emigrant Japanese food culture in South America
  
• Donabe - traditional Japanese hot pot recipes
  
• Kyotofu - very unique Japanese dessert cookbook
  
  Korean
  
  
• K Food - modern take on Korean street food
  
• Maangchi's Real Korean Cooking - great resource for Korean cooking in a non-pro kitchen
  
• Traditional Food - omnibus of four regions of Korean food
  
• Koreatown - authentic, approachable guide to Korean food in a US context
  
• Smoke & Pickles - Edward Lee's fusion of his Korean heritage and southern barbeque
  
• The Kimchi Cookbook - many, many recipes for kimchi...
  
  Malaysian
  
  
• Malaysian Cooking - good overview of Malay cooking
  
  Middle Eastern
  
  
• The New Persian Kitchen - modern Iranian food
  
• Ottolenghi - Israeli-Palestinian collaboration
  
• Persiana - dynamic modern recipes from throughout the Middle East
  
• Zahav - modern Israeli food
  
• Sweet Middle East - traditional and modern desserts
  
  Philippine
  
  
• Filipino Homestyle Dishes - good intro to classic Filipino dishes
  
  Russian
  
  
• Mamushka - focus on Ukraine
  
  Sri Lankan
  
  
• Hidden Kitchens of Sri Lanka - beautiful photo-cookbook on Sri Lankan cuisine
  
  Taiwanese
  
  
• The Food of Taiwan - um... food... from Taiwan
  
  Thailand
  
  
• Nong's Thai Kitchen - she beat Bobby Flay in pad thai
  
• Pok Pok - Portland's most AWESOME Asian restaurant
  
  Turkish
  
  
• Istanbul:Recipes from the Heart of Turkey - lovely focus on urban Turkish food
  
• Anatolia - wonderful approachable approach to Turkish cuisine
  
• Essential Turkish Cuisine - focus on history and evolution of Turkish food
  
  Vietnamese
  
  
• The Slanted Door - great Vietnamese restaurant cookbook
  
• Vietnamese Market Cookbook - focus on simple Vietnamese from fresh ingredients
  
• Into the Vietnamese Kitchen - traditional Vietnamese home cooking
  
• The Banh Mi Cookbook - the greatest sandwich in the world!
  
• Vietnamese Home Cooking - another great overview
  
  (edit: screwed up a couple links)

Asia's a big, ancient place. Even within each nation there are unique styles of regional and ethnic fare.

With that in mind, I'd love to see some recommendations here for awesome Indian, Filipino, Hmong, Uzbek, etc. cookbooks.

Japanese

Lets get beyond sushi and hibatchi.

Shizuo Tsuji's Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art is a great starting point. If you want to get technical you should check out Ando's Washoku or Hachisu's Preserving the Japanese Way.

If you want to start simple, Hachisu also has a great book on Japanese Farm Food. Ono and Salat have written a great noodle slurping opus in Japanese Soul Cooking.

Chinese

What we've come to think of as Chinese food in the US is a natural part of human appropriation of food styles, but with all due respect to Trader Vic's, crab rangoon and other buffet staples really aren't the real deal. Food in China is extremely regional. You don't have to go very deep to see the vast differentiation in spicy Schezwan recipes and Cantonese Dim Sum culture.

For your reading pleasure:

Mastering the Art of Chinese Cooking Eileen Yin-Fei Lo.

Breath of the Wok by Grace Young and Alan Richardson.

Phoenix Claws and Jade Trees by Kian Lam Kho and Jody Horton.

All Under Heaven: Recipes from the 35 Cuisines of China by Carolyn Phillips.

Some people might freak out that I'm placing Erway's The Food of Taiwan under the Chinese category, but I'm not going to get into a political debate here. Taiwan has had a lot of different culinary influences due to migration / occupation and that is really the take away here.

Go forth, make bao.

Korean

Korea is having it's moment right now and if you want the classics, Hi Soo Shin Hepinstall's Growing up in a Korean Kitchen is a good baseline. It has all the greatest hits.

You also can't cook Korean food without kimchi. The only book I've read is Lauryn Chun's The Kimchi Cookbook which is kind of underwhelming considering the hundreds of styles of Kimchi that have been documented. The process of making kimchi (kimjang) even has a UNESCO world heritage designation. With that in mind, I think it's only a matter of time before we see a English book on the subject that has depth.

Given the cuisine's popularity, there are several other cookbooks on Korean food that have recently been published within the last year or so, I just haven't gotten around to reading them yet, so I won't recommend them here.

Thai

David Thompson's Thai Food and Thai Street Food are both excellent. /u/Empath1999 's recommendation of Andy Ricker's Pok Pok is excellent but it focuses on Northern Thai cuisine, so if you want to venture into central and southern Thai fare, Thompson's the other farang of note.

Vietnamese

Nguyen's Into the Vietnamese Kitchen provides a nice survey to Vietnamese cooking. Charles Phan also has a couple of cookbooks that are quite good but I'm sure that there are zealots out there who would bemoan authenticity in either Vietnamese Home Cooking or The Slanted Door, but seriously, who gives a shit, the dude has Beard Awards under his belt for fuck's sake.

TL;DR OP means well but its long past time to bury "Asian" as a catch-all for such a large and diverse part of a continent, no?

You should check out Vietnamese Street Food by Tracy Lister and Andreas Phol. Here is a review by one of my favorite food bloggers.

http://stickyrice.typepad.com/my_weblog/2012/03/vietnamese-street-food-book-review.html

The blog review hits the nail on the head so hard. Seriously, the first time I opened the book I flashed back to wandering the streets of Ha Noi. I literally smell and taste the city whenever i open those pages.

I cannot state how much i love this recipe book. It is simple to follow, uses easy to acquire ingredients, and the recipes are authentic. You ought to be able to find everything (or close enough approximations) at a well stocked grocery store..

http://www.amazon.ca/Vietnamese-Street-Food-Tracey-Lister/dp/1742701426

This is a decent video on broth making for pho, a bit long perhaps, makes for a good watch though; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxM4t8vP-0A

What I do is pretty similar. There are the traditional ways of making it of course with the beef bones..but I've found I enjoy a mix of veal and pork bones more. Sometimes I use duck bones, just depends if I want something different taste wise.

There are a decent amount of recipes out there for broth, the one I played with at first was this; http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Vietnamese-Pho-Rice-Noodle-Soup-with-Beef-232434 and then a few from books like http://www.amazon.com/Vietnamese-Home-Cooking-Charles-Phan/dp/1607740532/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1414444571&sr=1-1&keywords=pho.

The key for me at least is I make my own spices, fish sauce, and trying to get down a recipe for Vietnamese style soy sauce. I keep to similar spices just homegrown instead..or from a CSA I belong too. Idea for me is freshness, home made dried star anise is going to be fresher than the store bought. It sounds like a lot of effort but it's not just for the Pho recipe, it's for everything else I use the spices for too. The only thing I have yet to grow is poppy (for obvious reasons) and saffron.

So that's basically my secret, follow the normal recipes but with pork and veal bones along with home made spices. If you can afford it, spring water for the broth I find to be good. I personally have hard water at home so I have to soften it which makes it salty..messes with everything I cook. Thus I use spring water. As to how much greatness that adds I don't really know..just better than using soften salty water.

Edit* - forgot, so in the youtube video, how they roast the veggies I do mine on a charcoal grill. A lot of my spices that need to be roasted I roast in a pan over charcoal.

Let me recommend an excellent Vietnamese cookbook.

This book takes you on a culinary journey and teaches you how to make your own.

Christine actually won the whole competition. Her cookbook, Recipes from My Home Kitchen: Asian and American Comfort Food was published two days ago.

I just came across this new one at Costco - beautiful photography and stories -- recipes seem legit:

My Vietnam: Stories and Recipes by Luke Nguyen

I had to find out if she won, so I went to her wiki. Apparently she wrote a cookbook that just came out. Amazon

Thanks for all the upvotes fellas! Recipe is from this book http://www.amazon.com/The-Foods-Vietnam-Routhier/dp/1556709595

Recipe is as follows: http://imgur.com/0btnUGY.jpg but replaced with chicken in lieu of beef and toasted sesame seeds in lieu of peanuts. My mom cooks northern style which typically isn't as sweet so she nixed the sugar and modifies the spice amounts to taste as she cooks.

Get this book. My copy is tattered and worn from overuse. I have over 20 cookbooks at home but this is the one I always go back to.