Vietnamese Caramel Sauce

Ever since trying Catfish simmered in Vietnamese Carmel Sauce last year, I've been wanting to try to make it myself.  One of my most favorite cookbooks is Andrea Ngyuen's "Into the Vietnamese Kitchen: Treasured Foodways, Modern Flavors."  I finally decided to try and make the caramel sauce. Although only 2 ingredients (sugar and water), it is quite a tentative process.  You really have to keep your eye one that sugar or it will turn into a hard caramel.


Here is my adventure in making Caramel Sauce!

This is the beginning where 1 cup of sugar is boiled at medium heat with 1/4 cup of water

It starts to bubble over and turn into a slight champagne color

As you can see, it starts to get darker starting from the sides of the pot inward.

It is starting to reach it's caramel color stage but it's still not time to take it off the heat

After it turns a dark coffee color, you take it off the heat and cool the pot off in a shallow pool of water in the kitchen sink. The pot will sizzle and hiss but it stops the cooking process. Then you add 2/3 cup of water and put it on the stove again over medium heat until all the caramel merges with the water into a sauce consistency.

Take it off the heat to cool. It shouldn't harden but stay liquid. It becomes the consistency of a chocolate sauce.

I cooked it with shrimp and it was amazing!

You can cook any meat (catfish, shrimp, chicken) with about 2 tablespoons of the Caramel Sauce, 1 1/2 tablespoon of Fish Sauce and some Ground Pepper.  Just add scallions and thinly sliced onions after the meat is cooked through and eat with rice. So delicious!

Roasted Squash instead of Rice

Lately, my husband and I have been roasting all the beautiful winter squashes (Kombocha, Spaghetti, Butternut) to eat with our Korean food instead of rice.  We're trying to increase our intake of veggies but also decrease our rice consumption.  Being rice-loving Asians there are some things we just cannot eat without rice BUT if you're cooking a roasted, braised or pan-fried meat dish, it will taste amazing with squash.

 A whole Kombucha squash. Beautiful!

It is difficult to cut into pieces but you just have to use a heavy knife and put your shoulder into it! Just take out all the seeds and cut up into smaller pieces.

Roasted goodness! You can bake it at 400 degrees for between 35-40 minutes depending on how big the squash is.

Spicy Pork bbq and a piece of Kombucha squash wrapped in a Sesame Leaf. Yum!!

Here we roasted some Kombucha squash very lightly sprayed with Olive Oil and a little bit of salt and pepper. You can cook most squash in pieces in the oven at 400 degrees for between 30-45 minutes depending on how large the squash is.  Just keep an eye on it so it doesn't burn.


We've been eating it in lettuce wraps with Korean bbq meat and it tastes AMAZING!  My mom actually steams the squash and then throws it into Korean style braised beef ribs and that was ridiculous!  


If you have any recipes for squash of your own, please send them to me!