Vegetarian Spring Rolls (Gỏi Cuốn Chay)

I always feel that cooking at home is best, and the best recipes are the ones that are created with love. I mean that sometimes I want to do things in a hurry; however, sometimes I have ideas about making dinner even a day before or just after I made a meal already for that night. I think most cooks can share these same feelings with me for the same reason – they love to cook. There are many intangibles that make meals taste good, but especially our thoughts and our attitudes at the time the meal is prepared. I read a book a long time ago emphasizing this principal. We, cooks, have to be the most important factor for how the recipe is created or perhaps the main ingredient. The old saying is that the best way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, and when food is prepared with love, it satisfies and nurtures our hearts and souls on many different levels.

Ingredients:
1 small potato – peeled, skinned, and shredded
1 small sweet potato – peeled, skinned, and shredded

 

2 garlic cloves, minced
2 carrots – peeled, skinned, and shredded
Daikon – peeled, skinned, and shredded (about 2 cups)
2 oz. fresh oyster mushroom, cut into matchsticks
4 fresh shitake mushrooms, cut into matchsticks

 

2 eggs to make an omelet to be cut into matchsticks
2 shallots, thinly sliced
Fresh herbs, basil, mints, and cilantro
1/2 cup oil
Salt, sugar, soy sauce, and black pepper
Red leaf lettuce torn into big pieces
Dry Vietnamese rice paper
Sweet hoisin-peanut dipping sauce
1/2 cup hoisin sauce
1/2 cup water
2 tbs peanut butter
2 tbs rice vinegar
2 tbs ketchup
1 garlic clove, minced
Fresh hot chili chopped
Soy sauce, salt, and pepper to taste

Directions:
Soak both potatoes in cold water. Then drain to remove most of the starch.
Bring a pot of water to boil and blanch both potatoes quickly and let them completely dry.
In a saucepan, heat oil and fry the shallots until crispy. Remove and set aside.
In the same hot oil, fry both potatoes until crispy.

In a medium sauté pan, heat oil.  Stir in garlic and cook for 1 minute or until fragrant. Add daikon, carrots, and both of the mushrooms. Season with soy sauce, salt, sugar, and pepper. Cook the vegetables until just wilted but still can hold their shapes.

In a large mixing bowl, combine cooked vegetables, fried potatoes, fried shallots, and eggs and mix well. At this point, you might adjust the seasoning again.

Use a wet, clean kitchen towel to dampen the rice paper, a few at a time.
Take one spring roll wrapper (dampened rice paper).

  Keeping all the ingredients on your side of the centerline, place a piece of red leaf lettuce then a spoonful of the filling over the top of the lettuce.

Then fold up your end of the wrapper over the filling, fold up each side to prevent the ingredients from falling out, and then continue to roll up tightly into a log

 

 

 

. Continue the same procedure for each rice paper wrapper. Serve with the dipping sauce below.

To make the dipping sauce:
In a small saucepan, add some of the shallot oil. Stir in the garlic and cook until fragrant. Add the rest of the ingredients and bring to boil. Season with salt or soy sauce, if needed. Sprinkle with chopped roasted peanuts, if desired.