Crispy Vietnamese Crepes, or Banh Xeo, are a delightful treat featuring golden, crispy rice flour crepes filled with shrimp, pork, and bean sprouts. Served with fresh herbs and fish dipping sauce, these savory pancakes are a burst of texture and flavor in every bite. This could be made vegan by substituting pork and shrimp with tofu.
Ingredients
Minced pork:
1lb.ground pork, can substitute with fried tofu
½tspkosher salt
½tspblack pepper
½tspsugar
1Tbspmushroom powder
½Tbspfish sauce
6garlic cloves, chopped
1whole shallot, chopped
Batter mix:
2cupsrice flour, it’s important it’s an Asian brand
1tspkosher salt
½Tbspturmeric powder
¼cupcornstarch
¼cupcoconut milk
12oz beer, or 1 ½ cups
3cupssparkling water
1Tbspolive oil
⅓cupgarlic chives, or green onions, chopped
Crepe filling:
2lb.shrimp, with shell on, poop removed
minced pork
2onions, thinly sliced
1bag bean sprouts
Optional garnish:
red leaf lettuce
fish herb
basil
mint leaves
fish dipping sauce
Instructions
Marinate the ground pork with salt, pepper, sugar, mushroom powder and fish sauce and put aside.
Put all the dry ingredients of the batter mix in a large bowl and whisk together.
Then add coconut milk, beer, carbonated water, oil and chives. Mix well.
Put the batter mix in the fridge and let it rest for at least 3 hours, preferably overnight.
In a pan on medium high heat, add oil and fry shrimp with shell on until it’s pink and cooked through. Let it cool.
Then peel and cut the shrimp lengthwise. Set aside.
For the minced pork; first fry garlic and shallots for a couple of minutes in a pan on medium high heat, then add marinated ground pork. Let it cook untouched for 4 minutes on each side and then toss. You want the pork to have a nice brown color, and you obtain that by frying it untouched.
Remember to stir the batter well before making each crepe.
In a non-stick pan, turn heat on high to medium high. Wait for the pan to get extra hot, add a bit of oil then pour ¼ cup of batter and swirl so the pan is evenly coated. Make sure that you have a light film of the batter in the pan. If the film is too thick, your crepe will not be super crispy. You can pour the batter out of the pan to create a thin layer without extra batter sitting in the pan.
Turn heat down all the way to low, then take a small bunch of sliced onions, shrimp and pork.
Then add a handful of bean sprouts on one side of the pan. Cover with lid and cook for 2 minutes.
Remove lid, turn heat to medium high and brush oil on all sides of the crepe. Cook for 2 minutes. The sides will start lifting and that’s when you know it’s ready.
Fold crepe over and immediately remove from pan.
Repeat process. You don’t need to add more oil before pouring the batter again.
It’s best to eat them right away when they are nice, warm and crispy.
To serve, you can roll the crepes with red leaf lettuce and dip with fish dipping sauce, or you can put the crepe in a bowl, add all the herbs and lettuce and eat it like a salad with fish dipping sauce as your dressing.