Bánh Cuốn

Bánh cuốn is a paper-thin steamed rice-flour sheet rolled around minced pork and wood ear mushroom, topped with fried shallot and served with a light fish-sauce dip. It's a breakfast dish steamed to order, one sheet at a time, over a wide pot covered in stretched cloth — a slow, one-at-a-time process that means a fresh plate genuinely takes a few minutes to arrive rather than being reheated from a batch.

What it really is

A thin rice-flour batter ladles onto a piece of cloth stretched tight over a steaming pot, and within seconds it sets into a translucent, delicate sheet — thin enough to see the filling through once it's rolled. A spoonful of minced pork cooked with finely chopped wood ear mushroom, prized for the crunch it adds against the sheet's softness, goes onto the sheet before it's lifted off the cloth and rolled loosely around the filling. A scatter of crisp fried shallot goes on top, and it's served with a light, sweetened fish-sauce dip and often a few slices of Vietnamese pork sausage alongside.

The rice sheet has to be thin enough to see through, or the dish has missed the point. A thicker sheet turns doughy and masks the pork-and-mushroom filling instead of framing it — the delicacy of that translucent layer is the entire technical difficulty of making bánh cuốn well.

How it's served

• Warm, freshly steamed, rolled loosely around the pork-and-mushroom filling.
• Topped with fried shallot, with a light fish-sauce dip served alongside.
• As a breakfast dish, though also eaten as a light lunch.

How to write it on the menu

• Flag the fish sauce in the dipping sauce.
• Say if it's steamed to order, since the wait is part of what a guest is ordering into.
• Note if pork sausage comes alongside as standard or as an optional extra.