Crunchy Cricket Salad Rolls With Dipping Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Do Chua (Pickled Vegetables)
1 sm
daikon, cut into matchsticks
1 md
carrot, cut into matchsticks
2
Thai bird chiles, sliced in half lengthwise
1
clove garlic, smashed
2 c
water
1 c
seasoned rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp
sugar
1 tsp
salt
Nuoc Cham Dipping Sauce
2 tbsp
white sugar
3 tbsp
Vietnamese fish sauce
1 sm
clove garlic, minced
½ sm
bird’s eye chile, minced
¼ c
freshly squeezed lime juice
2 tbsp
crushed, roasted peanuts
Salad Rolls
2 oz
dried, thin maifun noodles
7-inch dry rice paper skins
Vegetable oil
¼ c
(1.5 oz) roasted crickets
1 c
mixed herbs (cilantro, basil, mint, and chives)
Crunchy Cricket Salad Rolls With Dipping Sauce
Since most of you will not be raising your own crickets for this meal, I suggest you purchase them dry-roasted online. If you just can’t get down with the crickets, pan-fried dried shrimp are a great substitute.
12-14 Rolls
Do Ahead: Make the Do Chua
- Add garlic, bird’s eye chile, carrots, and daikon to a 16-ounce Mason jar.
- In a medium saucepan, bring water, rice vinegar, sugar, and salt to a low boil, then remove from heat. Pour the hot liquid over the cut vegetables. Allow to cool and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Make the Nuoc Cham
- Add white sugar to a small mixing bowl and pour hot water over top. Stir to dissolve. Add the fish sauce, garlic, and chile.
- Once the liquid has cooled to room temp, add the lime juice and top with crushed peanuts.
Make the Salad Rolls
- Add maifun to a medium mixing bowl and pour boiling water over top until submerged. Let them sit for 15-20 minutes or until they are soft to the bite. Strain the noodles.
- Set up a large mixing bowl with warm water and arrange noodles, herbs, pickled veggies, and crickets on the counter. Lightly oil a dinner plate to use as your work surface for each roll.
- Dip the rice paper into the warm water and place on the plate. (Depending on the brand of rice paper you use, you might only need to quickly dip, whereas other brands will require a more thorough soak. Do a test to see how quickly they soften. They are easily to roll before they are too limp and sticky.) Add the herbs, noodles, and crickets as a compactly as you can, creating a dense central filling about 4" long and 2" wide.
- Fold top and bottom of the rice paper inwards, 1" over the edge of the filling. Turn the plate 90 degrees and begin to roll away from you, pushing the filling inside with your fingertips as you work, holding the roll together as best you can on either side.
- Serve the rolls immediately with dipping sauce on the side.
Julia Sherman
Julia Sherman runs Salad for President, an evolving publishing project that draws a meaningful connection between food, art and everyday obsessions.