Vietnamese Spring Rolls with Peanut Sauce

I love vietnamese spring rolls – they’re super easy to make, highly customizable, and healthy as well! This is usually my go to dish whenever I’m low on time and just want to quickly throw something together that I know will keep me full throughout the day.

I have a tendency to overfill my spring rolls to the point where my spring roll looks like a mini burrito -_- so I had to really train myself to portion out my filling just enough so that the spring roll looks presentable.

Assembling it can be a little tricky because the rice paper gets a bit sticky once it starts drying out. It’s also extremely delicate so there were a few times my sharp carrots actually pierced through the rice paper skin as I was wrapping it, creating rips 🙁

But ultimately, what you want to do is put a small amount of filling in the centre, then fold the sides into the centre, fold the bottom piece up, and then tightly wrap the rest as you roll it up ensuring none of the fillings spill out.

My favourite part of this dish is actually the Peanut sauce! Some people like to add some hot sauce to it to give it a little kick but I like to keep it simple.

Yield: 2

Prep time: 20 mins

Assembly time: 5 mins

Ingredients

Spring Roll:

• Rice paper
• Water
• Julienne carrots
• Thinly sliced green leaf lettuce
• Thinly sliced beef (I marinated mine overnight in some soy sauce, brown sugar, sesame oil, and black pepper)
• Thick rice vermicelli

Peanut Sauce:

• 1 1/2 tbsp peanut butter
• 1/2 tbsp hoisin sauce
• 1/2 tsp light soy sauce
• 1 tbsp water
• 1/4 tsp lime juice

1. First prep the peanut sauce. Combine all ingredients in a small mixing bowl and whisk everything together. Adjust amount of water added until you reach desired consistency. Set aside.
2. Cook your thinly sliced beef in a pan over medium high heat until both sides are seared. Set aside and allow to rest.
3. Cook an appropriate amount of rice vermicelli according to the package’s instruction. Rinse under cold water when done to prevent overcooking and set aside.
4. To assemble your spring rolls, soak your rice paper disks in some lukewarm water until it is softened and pliable.
5. Lay the rice paper disk on a plate and place all your fillings in the centre, ensuring there’s ample space around the filling to the edge of the disk (approximately 2 inches).
6.  Fold both sides of the rice disk into the centre, and while holding the sides in place, fold the bottom up towards the centre. With your remaining free fingers, tuck any extra fillings into the centre of the spring roll and tightly roll your spring roll upwards until it is completely wrapped.
7. You can eat the spring roll whole or cut it in half for better presentation. This also makes it easier to eat 🙂

You can put whatever you want as the filling in your spring roll really.. Some people don’t even put meat in theirs but I love meat too much to leave it out. The reason I didn’t include proportions for the filling is because it’s completely dependent on the person and how much filling they want, so feel free to adjust accordingly!

What kind of fillings do you plan on putting in your vietnamese spring rolls?