Bún Mắm Recipe (Vietnamese Fermented Fish Noodle Soup)
Bún mắm, or Vietnamese fermented fish noodle soup, is a flavorful dish with a hard-to-forget aroma. Bring some authentic Asian flavors to your dining table with today's recipe.
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Servings: 10 servings
Calories: 844kcal
Equipment
- Pan
- Meat Pounder
- Ladle
- Slotted Spoon
- Sieve
- Tongs
- Knife
- Chopping Board
Ingredients
Main Ingredients
- 1.8 pounds snakehead fish
- 1.1 pounds pork bones
- 0.4 pound pork belly
- 0.4 pound squid
- 0.4 pound fresh shrimp
- 0.4 pound fermented moustached danio (mắm cá linh)
- 0.4 pound fermented snakeskin gourami (mắm cá sặc)
- 0.4 pound Chinese-style roast pork belly
- 0.2 pound featherback fish paste
- 0.2 pound shallot
- 0.1 pound garlic
- 4 cow horn peppers
- 4 okra
- Ginger
- Chives
- 0.25 pineapple
- 1 onion
- 1 white radish
- 1 small sponge gourd
- 1 eggplant
- 2 sugar canes
- 6 lemongrass stalks
Condiments and spices
- 0.15 pound rock sugar
- 50 milliliters fish sauce
- 4 teaspoons brown sugar
- 4 teaspoons soup powder
- 4 teaspoons salt
- Cooking oil
- Tamarind
For serving
- Yellow velvetleaf
- Water lily
- Common knotgrass
- Banana blossom, grated, optional
- Water spinach, grated, optional
- Mung bean sprouts, optional
- Perilla (shiso or beefsteak plant) leaves, optional
- Vietnamese balm, optional
- Thai basil, optional
- Wild mint, optional
- 1.1 pounds thick vermicelli noodles
For The Dipping Sauce
- 0.1 pound tamarind
- 75 milliliters high-quality fish sauce
- 4 teaspoons brown sugar
- 50 milliliters hot water
Instructions
- Clean the shrimp's heads and devein them. Chop the snakehead fish into smaller pieces.
- Wash the pork belly, bones, squid, and vegetables carefully.
- Cut the pork roast into bite-sized pieces and arrange them on a plate. Crush the lemongrass stalks using a meat pounder, then mince them. Save the upper part of the stalks. Mince the shallots, garlic, and half an onion. Cut the chives, pineapple, sponge gourd, and white radish into pieces.Core and remove the seeds of the peppers and okra.
- Cut the pork belly into bite-sized pieces. Make thin, cross-hatch pattern slits on the sides of the squid, then slice them. Slice the eggplant in half and cut it into bite-sized pieces. Then, soak them in salted water.
- Pour water and the fermented fish into a small pot. Add shallots and half the amount of lemongrass stalks. Simmer for 10 to 15 minutes until the fish falls apart. Filter out the bones once the fish has disintegrated.
- Blanch the pork bones for 2 to 3 minutes in boiled salted water. Then, transfer the bones to a cold water bath and wash thoroughly to get rid of the debris and odor
- Next, pour water into a pot together with the snakehead fish, a few shallots, and the remaining lemongrass stalks. Season with brown sugar, soup powder, and salt. Cook the broth for 10 to 15 minutes over medium heat, then remove the fish and set aside. Add the shrimp and squid to the same pot, and cook for 5 to 10 minutes. Transfer them to a cold water bath.
- Add water, pork bones, half the onion, sugar canes, sponge gourd, white radish, pineapple, and the seafood stock into a pot. Stew for 1 hour and 30 minutes.After 30 minutes, pour in the fermented fish broth and continue stewing, skimming frequently.
- Heat some cooking oil in a pan and fry the minced lemongrass, shallots, and minced garlic until fragrant. Add the pork belly and stir fry for 10 minutes.
- Season the fish paste with pepper, brown sugar, cooking oil, and soup powder. Add minced onion and mix until combined. Stuff the fish paste mixture into the okra and peppers.
- Pour some olive oil into a heated pan and fry the okra and peppers until fully cooked on all sides. Transfer them to a paper towel lined plate to drain off the excess oil.
- After stewing the broth for 1 hour, remove the vegetables but keep the pork bones. Add the stir-fried pork belly and continue cooking over low heat for 15 to 20 minutes.
- Meanwhile, mix hot water, fish sauce, and sugar with tamarind in a bowl. Stir until well-combined, then remove the tamarind's seeds.
- Season the stock pot with rock sugar, soup powder, and brown sugar, and adjust to taste. Add the eggplant to the pot and cook for another 5 minutes over low heat. Blanch the noodles in boiling water with cooking oil. Peel the shrimp, keeping the heads.
- Arrange the roast pork, fish, squid, shrimp, okra, peppers, eggplant slices, and pork belly over the noodles. Pour in the broth. Sprinkle chives and ground peppers on top. Serve with herbs.
Video
Notes
- Fermented fish already has a high salt content, so don't add too many extra spices.
- You can try making this dish without fermented fish. The dish will taste different, but the flavor is still delicious.
- Add the accompanying herbs to the broth while it's still hot.
- Keep the pepper seeds if you want more spiciness.
- If you can't find snakehead fish, you can substitute it with other white, freshwater fish.
- The above cooking time is suitable for making 5 servings.
- Serve your noodle soup with chili sauce or Shacha sauce for more flavors.
Nutrition
Calories: 844kcal | Carbohydrates: 84.6g | Protein: 50.9g | Fat: 35.9g | Saturated Fat: 10.2g | Cholesterol: 147mg | Sodium: 3568mg | Potassium: 467mg | Fiber: 7.1g | Sugar: 19.7g | Vitamin A: 2IU | Calcium: 85mg | Iron: 5mg