Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Fish Sauce Vinaigrette
roasted brussels sprouts with fish sauce vinaigrette
I’m in love with the mellow, hint-of-bitter deliciousness of brussels sprouts; those little green orbs are addictive!
Chang has two recipes in Momofuku for brussels sprouts: sprouts with kimchi and sprouts with fish sauce vinaigrette. Really though, the recipe for the sprouts with fish sauce is actually roasted cauliflower or sprouts, but with my new-found love for sprouts, I went with the mini cabbage.
mint, sprouts, fish sauce, rice krispies, shichimi togarashi, cilantro
The sprouts are pan fried and then roasted in the oven until tender and toothsome. When they come out, they’re tossed in a fish sauce vinaigrette dressed up with mint and cilantro stems.
cilantro stems
The leaves of the cilantro are flash deep fried for a crispy garnish. I liked the fried cilantro leaves, they were super delicate, crisp and almost melt-in-your-mouth.
fried cilantro leaves
The other garnish was rice krispies tossed in oil and shichimi togarashi. The krispies were pan fried until aromatic and brown and then sprinkled on top of the sprouts for crunch. I made a bunch more than the recipe called for and served it on the side so there was extra crunch to go around.
The freshness of the cilantro and mint, the crunchiness of puffed rice, the nutty caramelized flavour of the roasted sprouts, and the spicy sweet umami of the fish sauce came together in an delicious pile of flavours. I think I could eat brussels sprouts everyday, especially dressed up like this.
roasted brussels sprouts with fish sauce vinaigrette
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So if someone were to undertake only one of the two brussels sprouts recipes, is this the winner? :)
KT,
Argh! That’s such a hard decision! The other sprouts have bacon, which I love and went really well with the nuttiness of the sprouts, but this recipe has a wack-load of fresh flavours. I think you’ll have to make both! I think I’ll have to make both again very soon…
Even though this is one of my favorite recipes of his for the flavor profile alone, I just wish the brussel sprouts were a little crispier all around. There are a tad mushy to be quite honest. I guess that’s what the crispy leaves and the rice crisps are for. Still. Know what I’m sayin’? The fish sauce… I use it on everything now…so good.
Dan,
I can’t imagine eating brussels sprouts that are crispy (probably because the only one’s I’ve tasted are my own). Maybe you can cook them differently then toss in the fish sauce? Or I think I’ve read that some people slice them really thin and eat them raw so they’re still crunchy. Thin raw slices tossed in fish sauce might be good.
hmmm, that sounds like a plan. I guess I’m expecting a texture like tramonto’s famous venetion potatoes or something…. baked, broiled, fried… crunch… yum.
Dan,
I do love crunchy potatoes, but I have no idea how to make crunchy brussels sprouts. Let me know if you do any experiments!
The variation of this recipe with cauliflower is delicious, too.
Eddie,
I’ll have to try with cauliflower soon, and do the deep-fying thing too. I’ve never had deep-fried cauliflower and am really excited to see what kind of texture it has.
Very nice, i like sprouts any way I can get them. Yours look amazing, the sprouts with kimchi sound great too.
Steph, you probably need to bake them first normally, then throw them in a deep fryer for a few seconds to get that outer crisp… probably peanut oil. I’ll get back to you and photo chronicle my exploits :)
Dan,
Awesome! I can’t wait to see and hear about how it tastes!
Ahhh, yours are much prettier than my were! Also, I burned my cilantro crisps. But holy hell YUM.
Another successful dish for sure, I skipped the rice crispies (more than just texture?) but the rest was great, the bitter/sour/sweet interplay was just great.
Glad you liked it! Brussels sprouts are delicious, I don’t know why people don’t like them.
Can you sub plain rice krispies? I am not able to find the Indian puffed rice.