Fish Sauce & Nuoc Cham Dipping Sauce ~ A Stinky Delight

Fish Sauce...Fish Sauce!? Yes it is as stinky as it sounds...actually its even worse if you take a straight nose dive into the nozzle of the bottle. The sauce smells like a cross between sweaty gym socks, three day old underwear and roadkill. There is nothing oceany about it, it straight up stinks to the high heavens. GOD FORBID you drop this bottle anywhere, especially at home, you would just have to move after that point. 

Yes its revolting, and on first whiff, you instinctively want to wrap the bottle in duck tape and bury it in the backyard. After trying Pho for the first time, I was introduced to this weird ass ingredient, also highly skeptical that anything fishy could be put in such a decadently chicken soup-on-crack dish. But yes. The secret is Fish Sauce. This stinky ass crap adds Umami flavor to everything. It brings out chicken flavors, it brings out pork flavors, it just adds roundness to foods...kinda like MSG!

 I happened upon Nuoc Cham Dipping sauce while my fat ass was ordering Vietnamese Spring Rolls at Pho Mai #1. Now, I have been to many a Vietnamese restaurants and I guess they are lazy or what, but they just use straight up freebase fish sauce with garlic, sometimes carrot slivers. Its repulsive to dip crisp savory eggrolls into that crap straight. I never tried it again and when I ordered eggrolls I politely would just keep the lid on and chuck that crap in the trash.

 Several months later at a family get together, some of my extended Vietnamese family members brought some of their own homemade stink sauce to pour over some rice noodle rolls. Ugh, I gave it another shot, why not right? Surprisingly it wasn't repulsive, it had a slight fishyness but not enough to run. I gave it another chance and this recipe was it!  Sweet, spicy, salty, garlicy and tart. I had to have this recipe, and it is the only recipe I'll ever use, and I think you should only use too. The secret to non/less offensive Nuoc Cham is to boil the fish sauce. NEVER EVER use it straight from bottle to table.  

Choosing a Fish Sauce  

Just use this one.

   I've tried them all, and my American palate can only handle this one and the Thai Kitchen Fish Sauce (get it at Walmart for $4) But general Vietnamese consensus is Three Crabs, its foolproof.  

NUOC CHAM DIPPING SAUCE 

(or more elegantly)

 Spicy Fish Sauce Vinaigrette

• 1 cup water 
• 1/2 cup white sugar 
• 1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons Fish Sauce  
• Juice from one good sized Lime , or 2 small Limes
• 3 Thai Chillis chopped finely 
• 2 cloves Garlic chopped finely 
• 3 tablespoons Rice Vinegar

 Bring one cup water to boil in a saucepan. Add 1/2 cup sugar, stir to dissolve, add fish sauce and boil for 10 minutes. Be sure to cover the saucepan while boiling or use a vent, open all the windows because this stuff will stink up the house for a few hours if you don't.
     Once your house is nice and smelly. Turn off heat. Take a glass jar or bottle and add the finely chopped garlic and chillis.  Pour in the lime juice and vinegar to the fish sauce and then pour into the jar. Let cool and refrigerate. This sauce lasts for about two months in the fridge.