Made In London Cook Book By Leah Hyslop

09.05.2018

Uyen Luu's Beef Pho Recipe

From Tudor oyster pedlars and Victorian pie and mash shops, to the supper clubs and street food scene flourishing today, Britain’s capital has always been a tantalising draw for those who live to eat.
In Made in London, Londoner Leah Hyslop offers a joyful celebration of the city and its food, past and present. The book features recipes invented in the city; such as the 18th century treat Chelsea buns (a favourite of King George II) and Omelette Arnold Bennett, created for the famous writer while staying at the Savoy Hotel. Alongside these are new, exciting dishes, inspired by the Leah’s eating adventures around the capital: such as a mouthwatering Pimm’s and lemon curd trifle, an unusual goat’s cheese and cherry tart and an easy twist on Indian restaurant Dishoom’s iconic bacon naan, one of the best brunches in London.
Interspersed with the recipes are short, entertaining histories and profiles about London’s food scene, including the tale of the 18th century ‘gin craze’; a profile of the East End’s most beloved greasy spoon; and why Scotch eggs might have actually been invented in a London department store! Short shopping guides, lifting the lid on such pressing gastronomic questions as where to buy cheese, the city’s most delicious chocolate shops, or the best cocktail bars for a nightcap (or two.) are also featured.
Beautifully illustrated with contemporary photographs of London, alongside vintage images sourced from historic archives, this is a book for anyone who has ever lived in, visited or simply dreamt of sipping a cocktail while watching red buses trundle by in the world’s greatest city.

Six of the best children’s meals

18.04.2018

The Guardian Feast April 2018

Desert Island Dishes Podcast

16.03.2018

She runs supper clubs and the UK’s only dedicated Vietnamese cooking classes in her Hackney studio.  She writes and blogs about food, recipes and travel. She’s worked with a whole host of amazing people including Raymond Blanc and Jamie Oliver to name just a few. Her cookbook, My Vietnamese Kitchen was a roaring success and you know her food is incredible when there is a tweet from Ottolenghi declaring himself to be the luckiest person alive as he was about to eat her food.

We talk everything from escaping to London from war torn Vietnam, the delights of school lunches and spam fritters. We talk about starting a business straight out of school and all the good things that can come from that business not necessarily succeeding. We discuss the changing face of Hackney, pioneering a food movement and the poet who makes the best crème caramel in Vietnam.

Six of the best pho recipes

14.03.2018

The Guardian Feast March 2018

From the traditional beef soup to a dry vegan version, these Vietnamese noodle dishes bring deep and rich flavours enlivened by the brightness of fresh, crisp garnishes

Six of the best winter salads

01.02.2018

The Guardian Feast Feb 2018

Chicken salad with radish and cashew nuts

Uyen Luu’s Weekend Feast Waitrose Magazine

09.10.2017

The National Geographic Traveller

15.09.2017

Vietnam: in perfect harmony

Vietnamese cuisine is one of the most flavoursome, fresh and healthy in the world. Many of its basic principles involve satisfying every taste bud with the perfect balance of sweet, sour, salty, umami, bitter and hot flavours — then combining perfect textures, such as silky meat or fish with crunchy vegetables, herbs and noodles to satisfy the bite, and explode with flavour.

Three child-friendly Vietnamese recipes

17.07.2017

The Guardian Cook Cover Feature July 2017

The Really Quite Good British Cook Book

17.03.2017

Summer Rolls & Chicken Curry Recipes

Good Things Magazine

09.03.2017

Chef Uyen Luu is famous for bringing a slice of Vietnam to London via her sell-out pop-ups and cookbook; so we sent her to Banyan Tree’s Lăng Cô resort to reconnect with her roots – and give her baby daughter a taste of her heritage and luxury living.

THE GEOGRAPHY OF VIETNAMESE NOODLES

23.09.2016

Momentum Magazine

In Vietnam, noodles are the thread of daily life. From flat rice noodles (bánh phở) in the morning to rice vermicelli (bún) in the afternoon, from rolled noodle sheets (bánh cuốn) as a quick street snack to thick, plump cylindrical noodles (bánh canh) at the end of the night, all kinds of noodles are enjoyed as a staple. But how they’re prepared and what they’re paired with varies greatly, and often depends on what’s available within the various regions of the S-shaped country.

The Meal That Made Me A Cook

21.08.2016

The Observer Food Monthly Aug 2016

One of the downsides of having a parent who’s a perfectionist in the kitchen is that it can be a struggle to start cooking for yourself as an adult. This is what happened to the food writer Uyen Luu, who runs a popular Vietnamese supper club in Hackney. Her mother wouldn’t allow her to help in the kitchen at home, and when she went abroad aged 20 and started pining for home-cooked food, she hadn’t the faintest idea how to make it.

Luu had left her film and video course at Central St Martin’s in the middle of term, travelling to New York with three friends to seek work experience on movie sets. They were on a tight budget and, she says, “there was only so many bagels with cream cheese I could eat. I missed Mum’s cooking so much – until then I’d taken it for granted.” Unable to produce caramelised sardines or tomato soup with sea bass in their tiny East Village apartment, Luu phoned home. READ MORE

Olive Magazine Fridge Raider

09.05.2016

The East London Food Book by Hoxton Mini Press

21.04.2016

Full Feature by Rosie Birkett

East London has become the most exciting place to eat in the UK. Home to a vibrant and diverse community, it has attracted a wave of fresh gastronomic talent, including top chefs, young producers and bold entrepreneurs. This book follows forty people at the heart of a culinary phenomenon from Michelin-starred chefs and specialist butchers to wild foragers and urban beekeepers. With in-depth interviews and lavish photography, EAST LONDON FOOD guides you on where to go, what to eat and how to cook it at home.

My Foodie Life On Instagram

17.04.2016

Homemade By You

Meet Uyen Luu, Who Turned Her Home Into a Supper Club

17.12.2015

Food52.com

Guests flocked to her open kitchen, which she filled with mismatched tables and chairs, for dishes like pork belly and perilla summer rolls, lemongrass sirloin steak, coconut and beer crêpes, udon noodles with lime fish cakes, and banana fritters with coconut custard. “I always wanted to have the supper club at home,” Uyen told us. “I wanted to be able to do it on my time, without the binds of overheads and admin. It was a case of comfort.”

Uyen was born in Saigon but moved to London in the early ‘80s, after the Vietnam War pushed the country into extreme poverty. “It was really tough. As refugees you turn up with what you’ve got on your back. It was hard to learn the language and get work. But it was better than being in Vietnam.”

MEET UYEN LUU, THE WOMAN WHO BROUGHT VIETNAMESE COOKING TO LONDON

08.05.2015

Suitcase Magazine

If Vietnamese is fast becoming one of London’s favourite cuisines, it’s safe to say that Uyen Luu had something to do with it. With her first supperclubs back in 2009, Uyen offset a dining trend that has since taken the nation by storm. Cooking dishes from her native Vietnam and serving to guests in her Hackney home, Uyen has single-handedly heightened our understanding of what true Vietnamese home cooking is.

The Saturday Telegraph

11.04.2015

The Saturday Telegragh

Uyen Luu’s wildly successful Vietnamese supper club in her East London flat has won praise from Jamie Oliver, no less. Here, she tells us how she came to set it up

Men’s Health- Lunch Al Desko

07.04.2015

How to Enjoy a Salad: Make Vietnamese Summer Rolls

04.02.2015

My first post in Huffington Post

Create Your Own
Essentially, you can put anything in a summer roll like you can make a sarnie out of anything that tickles your taste buds. Its bread-less and gluten-free. Use tamari or fish sauce if you want to make a gluten-free dipping sauce. If you balance the flavours of sweet (use sugar, honey, maple syrup), sour (use lime, lemon, vinegar), salty (use hoi sin, soy sauce, good quality fish sauce) and hot (use fresh chillies or chilli sauce, tabasco) you can achieve the most perfect, healthy and delicious snack or meal.

Its great with omelette, left over roast beef, roast chicken, grilled fish fillets, salmon sashimi, fish cakes, tofu… the roll is your oyster!

Tatler

28.01.2015

Fare Healthy

20 Vietnamese Foods You Need To Try Now

19.01.2015

The Observer Food Monthly Newsletter

The Observer Food Monthly

Yotam Ottolenghi Tweets

13.01.2015

Guardian Cook

The Guardian

Chicken salad with onion pickle

A Vietnamese dish full of vibrant, punchy flavours that are lifted and brightened by the onion pickle.

Olive Magazine

Harpers Bazaar

The pop-up: Carousel

On Friday I went to a fantastic pop up: Marylebone’s Carousel – a curated space by the team behind the Mile High concept, where a roster of talented guest chefs are cooking. Last week, food stylist and chef Uyen Luu put together a dynamic Vietnamese tasting menu, introducing many to a world beyond pho (and spotted supping on chicken congee, and pandan cake were Yotam Ottolenghi and Melissa Hemsley among the well-heeled crowd, a telling testimony if ever I saw one). Next to feature are chefs Henrik Norén and Magnus Villnow from Stockholm restaurant Gro, and St John Bread and Wine’s Tom Ryalls.
Carousel, 71 Blandford Street, W1, 020 7487 5564, email [email protected]

Jamie Oliver’s Instagram

18.11.2014

“I had a fantastic Vietnamese meal last night at a cute hidden away supper club in East London thank you @loveleluu great job to you and the family and the dog. the sea bass Congee with kale and ginger wow , great noodles, amazing exciting shredded salads with lovely spicy vinegar and nut dressings and Saigon summer rolls to name but a few!!! Of the 9 healthy courses and I Had a good giggle with a few friendly faces you might know the loverly @elliegoulding bless ya heart her boy @idougahole good man and that filthy scallywag that we all love @dexfletch you remember baby face or spike in press gang …… Good times jamie xxx”

Olive Magazine

The Observer Food Monthly

Jamie Oliver

02.09.2014

“what a beautiful book thank u !! big love jamie”

Delicious Magazine May 2014

06.05.2014

Stella Magazine

20.04.2014

Tomato, Tofu  & Fish Sauce recipe

Vietnamese Recipes: Stir-Fried Udon Noodles And Veggies, Caramelized Sardines in Coconut Water And Avocado Ice Cream

10.04.2014

Huffington Post

Stir-Fried Udon Noodles and Vegetables

Caramelized Sardines in Coconut Water

Avocado Ice Cream 

J’aime London

Alain Ducasse

4-page feature in Alain Ducasse’s culinary guide to London amongst award winning restaurants and classic London destinations

Uyen Luu: ‘Vietnamese food is about emotional wellbeing’

17.03.2014

The Observer Food Monthly March 2014

The author of My Vietnamese Kitchen on her extraordinary journey from refugee to cookbook author

When Uyen Luu – cook, blogger and supper club founder – invites you for lunch, you go on an empty stomach. As we climb the stairs to her kitchen, the smell of herbs and bubbling broth grows stronger. “I wanted to give you an idea of what proper Vietnamese cooking is about.

Luu describes herself as a “typical cook and feeder” – and when she tells you about the importance of food in her family, you understand why. Her cookbook, My Vietnamese Kitchen, is part autobiography. Luu grew up in Hackney after arriving with her mother and younger brother from Saigon in 1983 as refugees from the Communist regime. “People were starving because of the trade embargo,” she says. Up to 1.5 million tried to escape but many, if caught, were sent to “re-education camps”.

She has no memory of the camps, but does remember her grandmother on her father’s side, who opened up her front room as a small restaurant serving an “extraordinary noodle soup” to provide for her family. After her father, one of the “boat people”, was rescued by the British, he sent for them. But he had fallen in love with another woman at sea, leaving Luu’s mother to provide for her children. “Hackney in the 80s was tough,” explains Luu. “My mother sewed blouses that ended up in C&A in an East End sweatshop for 10p per shirt. But she cooked wonderful food on a budget, shopping for the best deals at Ridley Road and Brick Lane markets.”

After studying film and fine art at Central St Martins, Luu started her own small fashion company, juggling designing clothes with running a shop in central London. In 2009, she was forced to close as it proved too stressful. “The overheads were too high and I’d got myself into debt,” she explains, while dropping freshly made vegetable spring rolls into hot oil.

She worked, briefly, as a fundraiser for the Jamie Oliver Foundation and Oliver’s website; Luu even found herself teaching Oliver how to make perfect summer rolls for his TV show. At the same time, she was cooking for friends. “They’d all turn up here and I’d cook. They all said I should try getting into the food industry.”

Luu never intended to turn food into a career. It’s hard to believe, as she expertly mixes delicate dipping sauces, that she couldn’t cook her native cuisine until six years ago. “In 2009 I was cooking a lot of Italian because my mum never allowed me in the kitchen [growing up].” Luu then convinced her mum to teach her and began hosting what was then the only Vietnamese supper club in London. “Once you know the principles: how to balance salty, sweet and sour, and adding heat to that, it’s quite easy to master,” she says. “It’ll always feel like I’m trying to achieve mum’s standard – that’s where the bar is set.”

The rising popularity of Vietnamese food in the UK is not lost on Luu – “although my bugbear is when it’s done incorrectly”. Vietnamese cooking is very precise, she explains, while chopping spring onions so fast that I have to look away. “When I notice corners have been cut – the wrong type of noodles or herbs with the wrong soup – it drives me mad.”

Luu teaches me how to make summer rolls. Hers are expertly filled and rolled within seconds, while mine look like they’ve been through a hot wash. She looks a little disappointed. “Try again! I want you to master it!”

As I give it a go, Luu explains how she believes food affects mood. Vietnamese cuisine, she says, “doesn’t bring you down, it’s light” – in Vietnamese culture, eating is about emotional wellbeing, too. She continues: “Cooking is very emotional for me, it’s tied up into my family’s story” – she thinks for a moment – “and it brings people together.”

Rocket & Squash

14.03.2014

Rocket & Squash

“I’m still yet to taste a better pho in London than Uyen Luu’s. I remember sitting with Raymond Blanc in her little Hackney kitchen as he slurped the product of two hours of cooking and filming. For the first time in those two hours he stopped trying to show that he knew more than everyone in the room and fell silent (briefly, though it blissfully felt like forever) and, effectively, in love with Uyen’s soup.

It is key that the five taste elements are there (sweet, sour, salty, bitter, umami) but also that those qualities are balanced. There should be a real, meaty depth to the stock – which is thin, though the odd trotter or bone will provide just the tiniest bit of viscosity.

Having read Uyen’s book as well sat with her a couple of times as she prepared the broth, it seems odd to me that her standard is not met elsewhere. No offence, but it’s not rocket science. I guess in more commercial environments, corners are cut or ingredients and time gradually whittled down to the bare minimum. Love and care are probably important but unwritten and often forgotten seasonings.”

Uyen Luu’s Tenderstem® and Chicken Vietnamese Noodle Soup

11.03.2014

Tenderstem

I have written a recipe for Tenderstem

The Observer Food Monthly

The Observer

Out on Sunday 16th March 2014

The Best Pancakes In The World

03.03.2014

The Guardian: Word Of Mouth

Asia arguably rivals Europe as the continent with the best pancakes, especially in terms of diversity. Vietnamese banh xeo are not only delicious, but a boon to those with allergies or intolerances as they’re made without eggs, and with gluten-free rice flour and coconut milk.Uyen Luu has a good recipe for these golden, crispy crepes stuffed with pork and prawns in My Vietnamese Kitchen.

James Martin: Home Comforts

02.03.2014

BBC

“Childhood Favourites”

James shares the recipes that remind him of his Yorkshire childhood, including his grandmother’s roast shoulder of pork and her indulgent bacon sandwiches. Historian Gerard Baker delves into the history of childhood favourite gingerbread, and Vietnamese cook Uyen Luu explains how memories of her native grandmother’s beef noodle soup have inspired her to start a supper club business in her London home.

BBC One iPlayer link here

A Chapter In: “For The Love Of Cooking”

27.02.2014

Published By Callwey

By German photographer Charlotte Schreiber & writer, Yvonne Niewerth who kindly gave me a chapter in their wonderful book, Aus Liebe Zum Kochen which translates as, For The Love Of Cooking, published by Callwey.

The book gives insights to worldwide chefs, authors, critics, bloggers and restaurant owners’ passion for life and their deep attachment to eating. Its about their indulgence of good food and the enjoyment of being together.

‘My Vietnamese Kitchen’

20.02.2014

Stripped Health Magazine

When Uyen welcomes us into her home in Hackney, our senses immediately are hit by delicious, mouth-watering scents: she and her team (her mother and a friend) are preparing some food for a later event. ‘We have an launch party for my new book ‘My Vietnamese kitchen’ tonight,’ she explains. There are vegetables, herbs and baguettes everywhere.

I am intrigued by the fact that someone with a background in the arts may end up writing a book about Vietnamese cuisine: it’s very clear to me, as soon as I start interviewing Uyen, that she lives on the cusp of two cultures. On one side, she comes across as very much a Westerner, in lifestyle, surroundings and mannerism; however it’s very clear that she is also fiercely loyal to her origins, and it occurs to me that this may be a way to pay tribute to the country where she was born.

Hackney  is indeed a hub for Vietnamese outlets, restaurants and culture. Walking through the area, I spot two Vietnamese shops, three restaurants and even a Vietnamese business centre.  After the war in Vietnam in 1975 the UK started taking refugees from Hong Kong, a British colony at the time. They were mainly relocated to Lewisham, Southwark and Hackney:  Uyen’s family is from Saigon and they moved to the UK when she was five.

‘My inspiration was my mother’, Uyen says  without any hesitation, and with a glint of pride, when I ask how it all started: and it’s going well, with a published book and  a thriving dining club in her home…

Written by Journalist Elena Francesca Barbiero

Read FULL interview in the Premier issue of STRIPPED! out soon 2014

A Weekend of Feasting with Uyen Luu’s My Vietnamese Kitchen

Kavey Eats

Pete and I and a couple of friends spent the weekend feasting with Uyen Luu. And she wasn’t even there!

Instead, we cooked up a storm from her beautiful cookery book, My Vietnamese Kitchen. Over the weekend we made a dessert for our first dinner, another recipe for breakfast, one more for the next dinner and yet another for Sunday lunch. While the rain and wind lashed outside, we stayed warm and busy cooking and eating – what better way to spend a weekend with dear friends?

Uyen Luu was born in Vietnam into a close-knit, food-loving family – her maternal grandmother opened a noodle soup shop in her front room to help make ends meet during the tough times following the Vietnam War, and some of Uyen’s earliest memories are of her grandmother making and serving her fragrant bún bò huế to customers. Times were very tough during that period and Uyen’s parents made the decision to emigrate to London. Here, her mother continued to raise her family on a traditional Vietnamese diet, as best she could with the ingredients available here.

I came to know Uyen’s story and her cooking via her food and travel blog, where she shares a mixture of old and new memories and tasty recipes, all beautifully illustrated by her creative photography and styling. Since moving to the UK, she has returned to Vietnam often, and her travel journal posts are a particular pleasure to read.

Uyen and I met in person several years ago via her supperclub – she is one of the pioneers of the UK supper club phenomenon – and I couldn’t fail to be captivated as much by her gentle and complex character as by her food; she’s shy but riotous (and occasionally fiery), vulnerable but strong, superbly creative but genuinely modest, a social butterfly but also quite private. I love to sit in her kitchen, following her instructions to stir the stock, chop some vegetables, rub salt and oil onto the meat, and talk about life, the universe and everything. She has a knack for bringing out a protective feeling in me, and I’m always so happy to learn of her successes and joys.

So I was delighted when she announced her book deal, which resulted in this truly beautiful book. Her food is authentic, delicious and achievable and she’s taught many, many people how to make it during the cookery classes she also runs out of her East London home. Those numbers include greats like Raymond Blanc and Jamie Oliver, who are quick to acknowledge not only her skill with flavours but also her ability to teach those skills to others.

I was one of the many friends who helped Uyen with recipe testing when she was still writing the book, and when I saw the finished book, I felt very proud to have played a (very very tiny) part in it.

As I always knew it would be, the book is a visual feast. The team she worked with to style and photograph the book have captured Uyen’s very personal and quirky style amazingly well. First and foremost, the images showcase the food itself, but they also create a very warm and rich tapestry that tells Uyen’s story beautifully.

My Vietnamese Kitchen starts with an introduction to key ingredients. The recipe chapters are then divided into Breakfast, Soups, Snacks, Noodles, Lunch & Dinner and Sweets. Many of the recipes need only what you can find in a well-stocked UK supermarket, but of course there are some that require specialist ingredients. In this era of online shopping, these are no longer difficult to source.

Read more on Kavey Eats

New Cook Book

29.01.2014

The Kitchn/ Apartment Therapy

What’s the view out your window look like? Dreary and grey? Then take a step inside Uyen Luu’s kitchen. Breathe in the aromas of spices and chiles frying in oil and fragrant beef skewers roasting over flames. Fall into the lush and vibrant rooms of Uyen’s Saigon. This is a cookbook that inspires, transports, and leaves you aching for just one little taste of something bright and spicy — all at once.

Quick Facts

• Who wrote it: Uyen Luu

• Who published it: Ryland Peters & Small

• Recipes for right now: Omelette Banh Mi, Beef Noodle Pho, Sticky Rice with Chinese Sausage, Udon Noodle Soup with Fish Cakes, Fish Congee with Ginger, Sizzling Crepes with Pork and Prawns, BBQ Pork Belly Skewers, Tofu and Tomatoes in Fish Sauce, Avocado Ice Cream

• Major Takeaways: Authentic recipes, some of which will be familiar (pho and banh mi!) and some of which might take you by surprise (fried frogs legs and caramelized sardines!). Don’t expect to find all the ingredients at your local chain grocery store, but it should be easy enough to source everything at a well-stocked Asian market.

• Who would enjoy this book? People of Vietnamese heritage looking for a taste of home, world travelers suffering from Vietnamese street food withdrawal, adventurous cooks who want to a taste of Vietnamese cuisine not found in restaurants.

Food Books To Buy This Christmas

10.12.2013

MsMarmiteLover

Books for fans of Vietnamese cooking:
My Vietnamese Kitchen by Uyen Luu (Ryland, Peters)
This is possibly the prettiest book of the year. Uyen Luu, a supper club hostess of Vietnamese origin, came here as a boat refugee and settled in Hackney where her supper club is located. Interesting, detailed recipes and a vivid insight into Vietnamese culture and family. She styled the photos in this book so she is multi-talented. Props also to photographer Clare Winfield. RRP: £16.99
Things I’d like to cook:
Mustard greens and tofu broth
Fresh rolls with mackerel ceviche

A Sweet Sour Sea Bass Soup With Loyd Grossman

04.12.2013

Grokker.com

In Round 1 of the Food Blogger Challenge, Uyen Luu shows us how to cook her warming hot and sour soup with sea bass. This Vietnamese feast uses a mix of wonderful herbs and pineapple to give it its distinctive flavor combination with a delicious poached sea bass, making it perfect for a cold winter’s evening. Join Loyd Grossman in this Grokker Premium Video as he tries Uyen’s original dish, in the first round of Grokker’s Food Blogger Challenge. Remember to love this video below, if you would like to see Uyen in the next round

Cooking at Chateau Mango with ‘My Vietnamese Kitchen’

18.11.2013

Expat Diary: Vietnam

There is some major kitchen love going on at Chateau Mango for the cookbook ‘My Vietnamese Kitchen’ by Uyen Luu. I recently discovered the book in Artbook, a local shop in Saigon and have not been able to put it down since. Uyen Luu is based in London, having moved to the UK from Vietnam with her family when she was a young girl. This cookbook is thoughtfully written for those who may be attempting Vietnamese cooking for the first time as well as those who are looking to expand their Vietnamese repertoire.  Uyen explains everything there is to know about working with Vietnamese ingredients. If you have trouble finding a few, she has great tips for alternative ingredients. Before you start cooking you are well versed on herbs, spices, condiments, rice and noodles…the Vietnamese essentials.

This week we made Lemongrass Beef in Betel Leaves also known as ‘bò là lốt’  Fortunately for us… we have a plentiful supply of betel leaves and lemongrass growing in our garden. We turned it into a meal and had enough left over for lunch the next day.  I loved the flavours in this dish… lemongrass, garlic, chilli, sesame oil, sesame seeds, honey, betel leaves, fish sauce, roasted peanuts, Thai sweet basil, cilantro, mint and perilla….you can find the recipe here.   Our woman about the house, Huyen, cooks for us amongst many other things. She is one of the memories I will cherish most about our time living in Vietnam. Huyen prefers to cook from cookbooks, something I am only to happy to oblige her with. When we cook Vietnamese, which is most often the case, I always ask her opinion first, for she knows best. This recipe received a big  thumbs up from Huyen.

Fiona Beckett

15.11.2013

Matching Food & Wine

One of the cuisines I’ve always wanted to get to grips with is Vietnamese, not least because we don’t have a good Vietnamese restaurant nearby so I welcomed Uyen Luu’s beautifully illustrated My Vietnamese Kitchen with open arms.

This is one of the simpler recipes, a version of the popular Bánh mi that would make a fantastic breakfast or brunch dish this weekend.

Uyen writes: Bánh mi is a Vietnamese baguette originally inspired by the French and now a staple in Vietnamese cuisine. As with most Vietnamese food the lightness of the ingredients you fill it with is vital – no-one relishes being weighed down. The dough in the centre of the baguette is removed so that you bite straight through the lovely crisp crust to the filling within.

For an extra dimension, drop the sliced chillies into a bowl of good soy sauce and bruise them with the back of a spoon – this releases the chillies’ flavour and heat. Drizzle over the baguette.

Norwegian www.klikk.no

14.11.2013

www.klikk.no

Photography © Fay Elizabeth Harpham

Creme Caramel

05.11.2013

Sainsbury's Magazine

Guest Chef for Sainsbury’s Magazine

Click to view an adaptation of a recipe from My Vietnamese Vietnamese

Vietnamese Chicken Curry

Sainsbury's Magazine

Guest Chef for Sainsbury’s Magazine

Click to view an adaptation of a recipe from My Vietnamese Vietnamese

Roast Pork Belly Skewers

Eat.Travel.Live

These roast pork belly skewers are soft and delicious making them a perfect weekend meal for someone special.

They have beautiful Asian flavours and a lovely sticky texture, these are definitely an MSK favourite.

See more

Supper Club MasterClass For The Guardian

10.10.2013

Msmarmitelover

Uyen Luu is a writer, cook, photographer, food and prop stylist. She trained in fine art film and video at Central St Martins. She runs supper clubs and the UK’s only dedicated Vietnamese cooking classes in her Hackney home, and writes and blogs about food, recipes and travel. She writes for Time Out and her recipes have appeared in the Evening Standard. Uyen’s first cookbook ‘My Vietnamese Kitchen’ (Ryland, Peters & Small), published on the 10th October, will be available to buy.

Recipe For The Weekend

04.10.2013

Ryland Peters & Small

This week we have a recipe from a fascinating new book, My Vietnamese Kitchen by Uyen Luu. I say fascinating because this is not just a cookbook, but a window into the Vietnamese world through exciting stories and tasty food traditions. The recipes are truly delicious, so here’s one for you to try over the weekend. You can tweet us @rylandpeters with a photo of your results!

Stir-fried beef and fresh noodles

phở xào bò 

Phở noodles (also known as “ho fun” and used in phở soup) are fabulous for dry stir-fry dishes, as they are quick and easy to cook. You can use any vegetables you like in this dish and make it as simple or colourful as you wish. Prepare everything before starting so that nothing gets overcooked.

Sizzling crepes with pork and prawns

01.10.2013

Sainsbury's Magazine

Guest chef

UYEN LUU

Uyen is a London-based food blogger and supper-club host who also runs cookery lessons teaching Vietnamese cuisine. She is author of My Vietnamese Kitchen.

What Is Vietnamese Pho?

27.09.2013

BBC Food

Uyen Luu teaches people to make pho at a supper club in Hackney and has a recipe for beef pho in her new book My Vietnamese Kitchen.

She says: “The French brought a lot of ingredients over to Vietnam, including onions, garlic, carrots and potatoes.

“In the south, they use a lot of herbs and they have it slightly different than people from the north. But more or less, it’s a beef noodle soup, and it’s got special spices in it that makes it really unique.”

Pho is largely eaten as a breakfast dish in Vietnam, and while Uyen Luu says the British are not yet used to having a noodle soup for breakfast yet, she’s “sure it will take off very soon”.

“You can actually just have it anytime you want. But the reason you have it for breakfast is because it’s so spicy with all the fiery ingredients in it, it sort of wakes up the senses and it gives you a lot of energy for the day for your mind, your spirit and also your body.

“That’s why we have spicy things for breakfast.”

The Vietnamese prefer to eat pho out, and don’t make it much at home. But Uyen Luu says it is “actually quite easy to cook”.

“It’s a soup that really requires your attention, and how much love you give to it,” she says.

“You can have all the ingredients there and follow a recipe. But if you buy really good ingredients like good bones and cuts of beef or chicken then your stock’s going to be so much better… you have to sort of watch over it. It takes about four to five hours to make.”

But she warns, once addicted: “It could be like a lifetime’s work to master the broth.”

Eat Is East

12.09.2013

EasyJet By Rosie Birkett

The pop-up-preneur

Uyen Luu
Uyen Luu’s Vietnamese Supper Club 

The bohemian atmosphere and antique crockery might be a supper-club staple, but Uyen Luu has a few tricks up her sleeve.

Every Friday night in her flat, the Saigon-born chef, who’s lived in Hackney since the age of five, serves up some of London’s best Vietnamese fare. “East London today is very different from when I was growing up,” she says. “It was all a bit grungy. Now it’s a place you want to be.” Luu, whose first cookbook, My Vietnamese Kitchen, is published next month, started her club in 2009, inspired by the area’s well-established love affair with Vietnamese food. “It first happened here about 20 years ago, when the artists were starting to move in. They ate Vietnamese food because it was so affordable, then told all their friends about it. More places opened to cater for the demand and that’s how the word got out.”

on the menu
Supper Club
Traditional dishes like banh cuon – silky rice pancakes filled with black mushroom and pork, topped with crispy shallots – and chef Luu’s pho, which is based on her mother’s recipe.
leluu.com

Lemongrass With Uyen Luu

01.09.2013

Eat.Travel.Live

– See more at: http://www.eattravellive.com/news/take-5-lemongrass-uyen-luu/#sthash.Ay1Okl5s.dpuf

How to make perfect Vietnamese summer rolls

01.08.2013

The Guardian

Featured in the Guardian Word of Mouth

Fillings vary, incorporating prawn, chicken and pork, but the basic aim is to cram as much fresh stuff into some rice paper as possible. If you haven’t tried them, you’re in for an absolute treat

Vietnamese Summer Rolls

27.07.2013

Delicious Magazine

How to make Vietnamese Summer rolls

Eat It

27.06.2013

Escapism Magazine

Asia may be an exotic land far, far away but one woman has brought the colours and flavours of Vietnam to life in her Hackney Kitchen…

A Cuppa With Uyen Luu

27.05.2013

Photography Monthly

In our second blog post celebrating food photography this week, we turn to photographer, film maker and author Uyen Luu who shares her first memories behind the camera ahead of her new recipe book launch.

With a Film and Video degree from London’s Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, Uyen Luu masterminded an award-winning food documentary for The Arts Council of England and has worked with celebrity chefs including Raymond Blanc and Jamie Oliver.

Her new recipe book My Vietmamese Kitchen soon to be on the shelves, London blogger and chef Uyen Luu talks to PM about her passion for photography and the bond it holds to her Vietnamese roots.

How did you get into photography?
The greatest gift I ever received was a Canon AE-1 SLR camera from the 70s. My uncle gave it to me when my mother, brother and I left Vietnam in 1983 along with photographs he took of us and all our family together so we wouldn’t forget them…. read more here

Food Styling With Uyen Luu

25.05.2013

Waitrose Kitchen

To tweak or not to tweak?

27.04.2013

James Ramsden

There are, as we all know, and broadly speaking, three kinds of cooks. There are the Deliacolytes who follow recipes so closely that they leave streaks of snot on the page…

12 of the best ice-cream recipes

25.04.2013

MSN Food

Rosie Birkett – Uyen Luu’s Vietnamese Kitchen

27.03.2013

A Lot On Her Plate

Meeting the beautiful and talented Uyen Luu has been a big part of this. I’m not kidding when I say that Uyen is a one woman food creative machine…

Tori Haschka – Vietnamese Cooking With Uyen Luu

25.03.2013

Eatori

For all the travel we’ve indulged in, there is one country which remains a haunting sore thumb on the to-do list. It lives as a niggle in my head and a stone in my shoe. The fact that we haven’t made it to Vietnam is something of a small travesty…

Three Vietnamese cuisine ambassadors

27.02.2013

Tuoi Tre News

Vietnamese cuisine enjoyed a bonanza in 2012 with many international and domestic TV shows featuring its appetizing recipes and starring some impressive chefs…

Inflight Magazine

25.02.2013

Easyjet

London’s love affair with Vietnamese food has gone into overdrive – something that makes Vietphile Rosie Birkett very happy indeed…

Uyen Luu Vietnamese Supper Club, London

02.01.2013

Vi-Vian's Food Blog

Uyen Luu Vietnamese Supper Club, London – When I started my research on supper clubs, I was surprised to see that there are quite a number of supper clubs around in England mostly, based in London…

We run restaurants from our own homes

27.10.2012

The Express

Vietnamese cooking: Uyen Luu’s home restaurant

The Guardian

Pho – the truth

08.08.2012

The Editor

‘I’ve never had a good pho in London,’ says Uyen Luu. ‘They seem watered down – nothing that a Vietnamese person would go back for.’ Uyen has lived in Hackney since she was a schoolgirl, and run supperclubs from her house for three years. She has shown Jamie Oliver and the FT how to make pho, using know-how she picked up from her mother, who, in turn refined her own technique over years…

A Vietnamese Kitchen Goddess

03.08.2012

Kitchen Goddess

London based, Uyen Luu, Writer, Photographer and Good Cook talks to Kitchen Goddess about her life which now revolves around the kitchen, Vietnamese style of course

Olympic Eatathon By Victoria Stewart

27.07.2012

The Evening Standard

Hot Dinner Summer Rolls Recipe By Uyen Luu

25.07.2012

The Evening Standard

Dating In London

02.07.2012

Scout Magazine

Even when a date falls from the sky we have all felt the white- knuckled anxiety of looking for a last minute date place, desperately slamming “decent cocktail bars, Clapham,” into Google and seeing what comes up…

100 Best Dishes

27.06.2012

http://now-here-this.timeout.com/2012/06/23/100-best-dishes-blogger-loveleluu-tells-us-why-she-loves-beef-pho/

Our list of 100 best dishes in London is a sure fire way to get you hungry. Sweet, savoury, spicy, fancy, cheap, exotic and classic – this is one hell of an edible bucket list. As if that wasn’t enough to get your mouthwatering, we’ve also asked some of London’s best food bloggers to pick their fave dishes in the capital. Today, it’s the turn of Uyen Luu, of Leluu, whose top ten dishes include Spaghetti with truffle…

TV Guest Appearance on Marco Pierre White

Kitchen Wars - Channel 5

How To Cook Vietnamese: Essential Vietnamese Ingredients By Uyen Luu

25.06.2012

Good Food Channel

In the second of her series of blog posts on how to cook Vietnamese food, guest blogger Uyen Luu explains how some of the key ingredients are used.

Uyen Luu’s Supper Club

02.06.2012

Betty Magazine

Good Food Channel

27.05.2012

The Good Food Channel

She hosts a London supper club Love, Leluu, welcoming strangers from all walks of life in her East London flat and invites them to eat her favourite Vietnamese dishes – dishes that she learned from her mother. Uyen is one of London’s bloggers, writing mainly about her life with Vietnamese food and also holds Vietnamese cooking classes in her kitchen…

Eight Courses Down

25.05.2012

She Loves London

A few hours before myself and three friends embarked on Friday night’s plans, there was confusion in the air…

Young British Foodie: Uyen Luu

The Evening Standard

Cooking Tips

20.05.2012

Snig's Kitchen

I am really thrilled to have a guest post from the lovely Uyen Luu. An expert in Vietnamese food, Uyen demonstrated the basics of Vietnamese food to Jamie Oliver in an extended film shoot…

Fork Magazine

15.05.2012

“When Jamie Oliver asked her to show him how to cook some Vietnamese dishes Uyen Luu quietly expanded her class size via her blog. Like her supper clubs, Luu asks for a suggested donation from people who attend her classes, and in return you will be given a rare insight into real Vietnamese cooking. Whether you’re yearning for the authentic pho or want a unique cooking experience from a now legendary supper club, we can guarantee that you’ll definitely have a good time with Uyen”.

The Queen of Supper Club

27.04.2012

The Skinny Bib

Uyen Luu needs no introduction. She entered the London food scene a few years ago, shook it all up with (Fernandez &) Leluu Supper Club, and given the proliferation of supper clubs these days, has become a somewhat inspirational figure. Certainly, there had been a lot of expectation on my part (especially because I had to drag myself all the way to Hackney), which by the end of the night, was surpassed…

Back to School: Leluu’s Vietnamese Cooking Class

22.04.2012

Snig's Kitchen

Very Vietnamese

14.02.2012

Time & Leisure Magazine

Everyone has their own special comfort food, a particular dish that not only nourishes but improves your mood.

Supper Club

27.01.2012

A London A Day

Supper Clubs are all the rage don’t ya know. And just before Christmas me and some of the gang decided to check one out. Specifically we decided to check out Love, Leluu’s supper club because of the blog post recommendation from Ben Wallace (see below).

My very first Supper Club

27.12.2011

Itchy & Bacon

After salivating over the array of supper clubs in East London for the last two years on my best friend Twitter, I finally chose one ten minutes walk from our flat, Leluu & Blyde.

Lessons in sweet + salty + sour

30.11.2011

Kitchen Conversations

A good Pho loaded with lime, fresh herbs and chile is one of my favourite dishes. A dish that I have no idea how to recreate…so when Uyen of Leluu supper club started her Vietnamese cookery course I knew I had to go along…

Leluu Supper Club, London

27.10.2011

Chopsticks 2 Steak Knives

Let me invite you to think back to the 31st December 2010 and if possible to the last few hours before midnight. What memories spring to mind? I am thinking hard but I can’t even remember what I was doing on that day to celebrate. What I do remember were some of those resolutions that we make but which keeps getting recycled every year when we don’t fulfil them.

Food bloggers are Grazing Asia

08.10.2011

Time Out

Earlier this year, 4 London food bloggers formed a collective under the name Grazing Asia, with the aim of sharing their knowledge of Asian food. They host an array of events including cookery classes, supper clubs and wine matching evenings, each centred around a particular cuisine…

London Supper Club Review – Leluu Supper Club

16.09.2011

The London Foodie

One of the pioneers of the supper club movement in the UK, British-Vietnamese Uyen Luu is the brains behind Leluu Supper Club, an offshoot of the late Fernandez & Leluu (F&L) of Hackney, London.

London’s best Asian supermarkets

05.09.2011

The Guardian

Uyen Luu has lived in Hackney for 30 years and is a big fan of Longdan. She prefers buying her fresh goods on Thursdays (the main delivery day for the area) and likes to spend a bit extra on decent fish sauce. Her favourite is Viet Huong, “the Three Crabs brand. It’s expensive [around a fiver] compared to other sauces, but tastes a thousand times better”.

What’s it like to be … a Supper Club host?

14.08.2011

40 Not So Single

Okay so now I’ve been to a couple of undergound supper clubs I can understand why people may go to them.  The next obvious question is why host one? Seems like a lot of hard work to have people come over to dine at yours – I mean I really enjoy cooking and throwing dinner parties but doing it on a regular basis for strangers is definitely not for me.

Vietnamese cookery class with Leluu

04.07.2011

A Girl In Walthamstow

For the past couple of years, as part of my mission to seek out new and interesting dining experiences, I have been going to supper clubs in London. This is basically where someone opens up their home and transforms it into a mini restaurant for the night, and in exchange for a donation you are thrown together with other like-minded intrepid diners to enjoy a meal in a complete strangers living room. You get to hear about these places mainly by word of mouth, the best places flourishing though their good reputation and ending up over-subscribed every night.

Leluu Supper Club

27.06.2011

Vegetarian & Me(at)

On Friday, for my friend Lucy’s birthday, we chose to dine out at a Supper Club, something I have wanted to do for a while now. Supper Clubs are a new phenomenon sweeping across London. People open up their homes to diners and show off their cooking skills and the diners pay to eat. Lucy is a huge fan of Vietnamese and having searched for somewhere local to her and read many reviews we finally came across the renowned Leluu Supper Club located close to London Fields.  I haven’t eaten Vietnamese food many times so I was excited at the prospect of trying something new, and I sure did…

V is for posh Vietnamese

27.05.2011

ES Magazine

“Hackney’s ‘Little Hanoi’ is spreading west with the opening of Cay Tre on Dean St, an elegant offshoot of the Shoreditch Vietnamese joins Cay Tre and Viet Grill.  “I’m please because there are no Vietnamese places in this part of town” says chef, Mark Hix,whose restaurant is on nearby Brewer St.  Supper Clubbers should visit Fernandez & Leluu’s blog to find out when they are next serving a Vietnamese menu.” 

From Vietnam With Love By Tim Hayward

21.05.2011

The FT Weekend Magazine

Tim Hayward learns how to make pho at home. Ask most chefs or foodies their favourite meal and they won’t mention a…