Banh Gio (& Banh Cuon Filling)
This was one of my favorite foods as a kid – it’s relatively plain and so perfectly carb-y. These days, my kids and nieces/nephew love it just as much. My niece seems to eat this for breakfast, lunch, and dinner when my aunt (her grandmother) comes to visit, and for us, it’s a go to for lunch when we’re feeling lazy since I like to leave a backup stash in the freezer.
In addition to being simple and delicious, there is also a social aspect to banh gio. Growing up, my mom and aunts would gather on weekends to make it together. Because it makes a fair amount, they’d end up either splitting or further distributing the result to the rest of the family.
You can find way more complex recipes out there on the internet that are probably more delicious but this is the homestyle way that my family has done it for decades. The batter is a simple mix of cornstarch and chicken broth. My mom swears by the following brands and given how little goes into the batter, I’d stick with these as switching things up would likely change the taste significantly.
The filling is where the flavor really comes from and there are a lot of familiar ingredients that have already showed up multiple times on this blog: pork, dried mushroom, shallots, onion, veggie seasoning, and fish sauce.
Shallots cut into half moon shapes – first cut shallot in half length wise, and then slice thinly. 
finished batter and meat filling
Once the meat and batter have cooked, set up the assembly station and get started. There’s no rush here but also letting the batter cool for too long can make it more difficult to work with. The traditional way to package banh gio is with banana leaf (often in a pyramid shape). However, it’s a pain to find banana leaf and assemble so we use foil in our house which lacks some of the flavor that the banana leaf gives off but otherwise works.
oil 
bottom batter layer 
meat 
dollop of batter on top 
fold into rectangle
The last step is to steam the banh gio. My mom has a huge steamer, which is really ideal for cooking things like this quickly. It’s ok to layer the banh gio up to about 3 layers, which allows us to complete the steaming in just 2 batches. After 10 minutes, that’s it!
Note that the filling recipe here actually works for banh cuon (Vietnamese rice crepe) as well. However, since banh cuon is usually enjoyed in a single sitting, I halve the recipe to serve 4-6.
Happy cooking!
Banh Gio
Equipment
- Steamer (ideally large)
- Precut foil wrappers or foil cut into squares (25)
Ingredients
Batter
- 1 box cornstarch (ideally Kingsford brand)
- 60 oz chicken broth (ideally 4 14.5oz Swanson cans)
- 45 oz water (3 cans)
- 1 tsp salt
Filling
- 2 lbs pork
- 1/3 bag dried mushrooms
- 1 onion
- 2 shallots
- 1 tbsp veggie seasoning
- 2 tbsp fish sauce
- 1 tsp pepper
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil + additional oil (optional) during assembly
Instructions
- Soak dried mushrooms in water (10 minutes).
- Chop onions and thinly slice shallots in half moons.
- Fry shallots with 1 tbsp oil until golden (about 3 minutes). Add onions and cook for another 3 minutes.
- Add meat, veggie seasoning, fish sauce. Cook through, breaking up large chunks of meat (about 8 minutes).
- Add drained mushrooms and pepper. Cook for another 2 minutes.
- Combine cornstarch, chicken broth, water, salt slowly in large pot. Turn on heat to medium and cook while mixing continuously until smooth and thick (about 8 minutes).
- Assemble: oil, bottom batter layer, meat, dollop of batter on top. Fold and close foil packet.
- Steam assembled foil packets for 10 minutes and allow to cool.