Easy Vietnamese

We had our first supper club since August was born so I chose something easy to make in case the babe needed my attention. Good thing, too, because Todd ended up not coming at all, which left the childcare to David, the other husband who rarely brings something to make. He was completely willing and a great babysitter even though I gather he hasn't had much experience with babies. The host's husband, Eric, also spent some time with August on his knee while I chopped. It's good for these guys.

Anyway, I made rau thom com ga, mint rice with chicken. I had wanted to make a sticky-rice dish, but this is more of a fluffy-rice dish. I wasn't going to make my own stock so I poached a whole chicken breast in a panful of water with some peppercorns, star anise and ginger (not sure the flavor translated). Then I added Penzey's chicken soup base to 2 3/4 cups of the strained poaching liquid and cooked 2 cups jasmine rice in it (put stock and rice in a pot, bring to a boil, cover and reduce to a simmer for 20 minutes, then let sit another 10). Once the rice was done I mixed in a finely diced small red onion, a cup of julienned mint leaves and the chicken, shredded. Served with nuoc cham, which is a mixture of 5 tablespoons sugar, 3 tablespoons water, 1/3 cup fish sauce, 1/2 cup lemon or lime juice, 1 minced garlic clove and 1 minced Thai chile (this is the recipe in my cookbook; on Saturday Lisa made the nuoc cham for her dish, bun, and I just used some of hers).

We also had Lisa's bun with pork (a salad of greens, basil, mint, cucumber, sprouts, noodles and peanuts), Julie's canh ca nau dua (fish and pineapple soup, which she used a fish head for), and a very bizarre coconut and banana dessert with tapioca (which I'm not a big fan of anyway) and sweet potato noodles.

Julie and Lisa both said they had fun shopping for the more unusual ingredients (the guy at the fish shop almost seemed excited when Julie asked for the fish head), but all the ingredients for my recipe were available, as Rachael Ray would say, right in the regular grocery store. August and I'll have to do more fun shopping for the next supper club, which I think we decided would be recipes with alcohol.

Todd had some of my rau thom com ga warmed up when I got home and said he liked it, even without the dipping sauce. It was better, with more flavor, than I thought it would be, but I liked it drizzled with the sauce. The fragrant jasmine rice really helped boost the flavor.