Pho Spring Rolls

After successfully giving up meat for the entire month of January (except for one ham, cheese and butter on baguette), I couldn’t wait to make these pho spring rolls. Pho spring rolls are your favorite Vietnamese soup deconstructed. Thinly sliced porchetta, bean sprouts, hot chilis, lime and cilantro all rolled up into one neat little package, sweet and spicy sauce included.

I love spring rolls because a little bit of prep time on Sunday means a lunchbox full of deliciousness on Monday!

No Soup for You

Truth be told, I’m really not a soup person. If it’s a chilly day and pho was on offer, I’d definitely eat it. But I’d probably grab a hot tuna melt or a Reuben instead if I had the choice.

Pho spring rolls are the perfection adaption for someone like me who isn’t into broth.

Roast Beef Spring Rolls

I made the first batch of pho spring rolls with deli sliced roast beef since beef is the most commonly used meat in pho. It was good, so you can definitely do that if you can’t find porchetta.

I recommend going to the actual deli counter and having them shave your cold cuts. There’s just something about that shaved texture that tastes better in a pho spring roll than a thick slice from the package.

The mung bean sprouts in the produce section were looking pretty miserable the day I made the roast beef spring rolls, so I used pea shoots instead.

It was a good option in a pinch, but I would recommend cutting the bottom 2 inches of stems off the pea shoots and chopping them up before layering them.

That said, mung bean sprouts are key to the pho spring roll experience so get those if you can.

Porchetta for the Win – Jimmy’s Food Store

The true vision for pho spring rolls was to use sliced pork, not roast beef. Pork like you would use in a Cuban sandwich. Most mainstream grocery stores will have at least one kind of pork at the deli counter, so check there.

I shop pretty much exclusively at Whole Foods and they don’t seem to carry pork deli meat so I was out of luck for this idea until someone told me about Jimmy’s Food Store.

Jimmy’s Food Store is the quintessential Italian neighborhood market selling all of the essentials from cannoli’s to pasta to wine. It’s dark, a bit dingy and probably doing some kind of business other than groceries.

In other words, it’s an absolute gem.

They have a deli that makes sandwiches to order in the back, so while I was waiting for my hot Italian sausage with marina, mozzarella, sweet peppers and onions, I did a little shopping.

I was OVER THE MOON because I found fresh arugula that was actually worth buying and the brand of burrata that I love because the container comes with 4 single serving portions instead of one huge one like most brands.

More importantly, they sell porchetta. Porchetta is pork belly wrapped in pork loin which is usually then thinly sliced into cold cuts. It’s PERFECT for pho spring rolls.

Pho Spring Rolls – Prepping the Wrapper

Making pho spring rolls is fun! You’ll need spring roll wrappers to make pho spring rolls, and I recommend Blue Dragon brand. I’ve used Ocean’s Halo and they were a mess to work with.

Get a medium skillet and sit it in your sink. Fill it about halfway with tap water. Rough chop the bean sprouts and cilantro, and finely slice your chili pepper. Have everything staged around your work surface. Your ready to get rolling!

Carefully pull a spring roll wrapper out of the package. They are fragile, so be gentle. Place the dry wrapper into your skillet of water and push down gently with your fingers to submerge.

Use your fingers to shimmy the wrapper in the water, keeping it fully submerged for 10 seconds. That’s it! Carefully lift it from the water, letting the excess water drip off. Your wrapper will still be somewhat stiff and you should still be able to see the ridges. Lay the wrapper on your flat work surface.

Pho Spring Rolls – Let’s Wrap It Up

The hardest part is over! Now you’ll just layer your ingredients, wrap and fold. As promised, the sauce gets rolled up right with the rest of it so no extra steps when you’re ready to take a bite.

Pho spring roll sauce is a simple mixture of hoisin sauce and sweet chili sauce. I just put about 3 tbsp of each in a jar and shake it up.

Spread one spoonful on the bottom 1/3 of your wrapper to get started. Leave room on each side because you’re going to be folding the sides in to close the ends of the pho spring roll.

I tried layering a few different ways but decided the best way was to start with the pork so it can absorb some of the sauce.

Are you drooling over this porchetta yet?

Next comes the bean sprouts. I give them a rough chop first.

Then a generous amount of chopped cilantro. Layer in your hot chilis (serranos or jalapȇnos) and give your pho spring roll a nice squeeze of fresh lime juice.

Your spring roll wrapper should be totally pliable by now. Carefully pick up the bottom edge and fold it over the roll, tucking it under and pulling back toward yourself to snuggle everything in.

Now flip over the right and left edges to seal the ends and then finish rolling it up.

The wrapper will stick to itself as you finish rolling. Voíla!

Pho Spring Rolls for Days

You can stack pho spring rolls in plastic container and refrigerate until its time to eat. I like to put a layer of parchment paper on the bottom and between layers.

These will last for several days in the fridge. Keep any extra sauce for dipping.

I would say that depending how fat you make your pho spring rolls, 2 would be the right lunch portion. If you’re hungry, plan on 3.

On A Roll?

Now that you’ve conquered pho spring rolls, you can get creative with other ingredients. Subscribe below so you don’t miss tofu spring rolls, coming soon. And if you’re feeling very confident, maybe it’s time you tried rolling your on sushi?

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