Pork meatball banh mi
Garlicky Vietnamese pork meatballs in a crusty baguette with sriracha mayo, quick-pickled carrots, cucumber, jalapeño and cilantro.
- 50 min total
- 40 min hands-on
- A little more hands-on
- Serves 4
- About $2.76 a serving
- 780 calories
- Good the next day
- Dairy-free
Dolly says: Make the full amount. It’s just as good for lunch the next day.
Ingredients
For 4 servings.
- 1½ cups shredded carrots
- 1 lb ground pork
- 1 tbsp fish sauce
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 green onions, finely chopped
- ¼ cup mayonnaise
- 2 tsp sriracha
- 1 French bread
- 1 cucumber, cut into long thin strips
- 1 jalapeño, thinly sliced (optional)
- ½ cup cilantro, sprigs
From your pantry
- ½ cup rice vinegar
- 2½ tbsp sugar, divided
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
- ½ tsp black pepper
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
Each serving has about 780 calories, 32 g protein, 70 g carbs and 40 g fat, and costs about $2.76 at typical US grocery prices. Both are estimates from what the recipe uses.
Missing something?
- No shredded carrots? Carrots work.
- No green onions? Chives work.
- No sriracha? Hot sauce works.
- No French bread? Sourdough bread works.
- No cucumbers? English cucumbers or mini cucumbers work.
- No cilantro? Fresh parsley works.
Steps
Tap an underlined word for a quick explanation.
the vinegar, 2 tablespoons of the sugar, the salt and ½ cup warm water until dissolved. Add the carrots and leave them to pickle while you cook.
Stir. Stirring means moving food around with a spoon or spatula so it cooks evenly and doesn’t stick. Unless the recipe says constantly, every so often is plenty, and it gives food time to brown.
How you’ll know: When you drag the spoon across the bottom, nothing is sticking or scorching.
In a bowl, mix the pork, fish sauce, garlic, green onions, cornstarch, pepper and the rest of the sugar with your hands, just until combined.
Dolly’s tip: Mix only until it comes together. Squeezing it too much makes the meatballs tough.With wet hands, roll the mixture into 16 balls, a tablespoon each. Then wash your hands and anything the raw pork touched.
Heaping. Heaping means a rounded mound piled above the rim of the spoon or cup, not leveled off. It’s a little more than the measure, on purpose.
How you’ll know: The pile sits above the edge of the spoon, and you leave it there instead of scraping it flat.
Food safety: Wash your hands, the board and the knife with hot soapy water after touching raw meat, and don’t rinse raw chicken in the sink.
Heat the oil in a large over medium. Add the meatballs and cook 10 to 12 minutes, turning every couple of minutes, until all over and 160°F in the middle.
Skillet. A skillet is a frying pan: wide and flat with low, sloped sides. The shape lets steam escape, so food browns instead of stewing.
How you’ll know: It’s the pan you’d fry an egg in, and a 10 or 12 inch one handles most recipes.
Brown. Browning means cooking until the outside turns brown, which is where a lot of savory flavor comes from. Give food room and time without stirring, or it steams and stays gray.
How you’ll know: The food looks brown rather than gray, and the kitchen smells toasty and savory.
Medium heatTimer: 11 min
Dolly’s tip: If they brown too fast, turn the heat down. The middle needs time to cook. Cut one open to check there is no pink.Food safety: Ground beef, pork and lamb are done at 160°F. When it’s cooked through there’s no pink left anywhere in the pan.
the mayonnaise and sriracha together.
Stir. Stirring means moving food around with a spoon or spatula so it cooks evenly and doesn’t stick. Unless the recipe says constantly, every so often is plenty, and it gives food time to brown.
How you’ll know: When you drag the spoon across the bottom, nothing is sticking or scorching.
Cut the baguette into 4 pieces and split them open, pulling out a little of the soft middle to make room.
Spread the bread with sriracha mayo, then add the meatballs, , with the pickled carrots, cucumber, jalapeño and cilantro.
Halve. Halving means cutting something into two equal pieces. Even halves cook at the same speed, so one doesn’t dry out while the other finishes.
How you’ll know: The two pieces look like mirror images of each other.
Drain. Draining means pouring off liquid, like tipping pasta into a colander or spooning extra fat out of the pan. Pour hot grease into a can or jar, not the sink, where it hardens and clogs the pipes.
How you’ll know: Only a few drips are left, and the food isn’t sitting in a puddle.
Dolly’s tip: For lunches, keep the meatballs, pickles and bread separate and build it at lunch so the bread stays crusty. The meatballs are good cold or warmed.
Plan this in Dollop, and get the grocery list
Dollop puts this dinner on a night that suits your week, lists only what you still need to buy, and walks you through each step while you cook.
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