Spring Rollin’ into Summer

Spring rolls? Summer rolls? Salad rolls? Whatever you choose to call them they’re a wonderfully refreshing snack for a hot day! After last week’s warm weather spell I think summer is just around the corner, and this dish is a really fun one to have on hand.

According to Wikipedia these delicious handheld rolls are technically all spring rolls – just with different fillings, shapes, sizes, and cooking methods. This popular Asian snack is believed to have originated from China and usually eaten during the Spring Festival aka Chinese New Year. They started as a pancake filled with the new season’s spring vegetables, which was a welcome change from the preserved foods of the long winter months.

For me, spring rolls usually refer to the Chinese deep-fried variety. My mom used to make them whenever she had a large party and our family friends all raved that they were “the best they’d ever had!” My 10-year-old self really loved them, funnily enough, despite disliking most of the filling ingredients my mom put in (my taste buds have changed a lot since then). Since I grew up with this fried version, I usually refer to the fresh wrapper variety as summer rolls.

What is so great about Vietnamese summer spring rolls isn’t just the fact that they’re served cold, nor because they seem so light (and therefore “healthy”). They’re perfect because you can really wrap whatever the heck you want into them!

Go traditional: fill with rice noodles, cilantro, your choice of fresh veggies, and a protein (such as tofu, pork, or shrimp)

Go healthy: skip the noodles or make veggie noodles

Go fusion: use whatever leftovers you have on hand – such as these Pad Thai rolls

Go sweet: fill with fruit

Go funky: like the hugely popular psychedelic salad rolls!

For my own version I chose ingredients that I might have on hand at any given time. I always have some raw frozen shrimp in the freezer, which I gently simmered until cooked through and then sliced in half lengthwise. Meanwhile, my crisper drawer usually contains half a dozen different vegetables: this time I found I could use up some cucumbers, red bell pepper, Bibb lettuce, radishes, and orange+purple carrots. I even got to use a new spicy Brooklyn-made Chinese sausage (aka lap cheong) that I found last time I went to H Mart (one of my favorite places to grab Asian ingredients, mentioned in my Bibimbap Tower post)! They’re not the healthiest ingredient by any means, so I sautéed thin slices just as I would bacon pieces – starting out in a cold pan over medium-low heat, rendering out a bunch of fat, and transferring them to a paper-towel lined plate to cool.

The toughest fun part is rolling everything up together… Gather all your filling ingredients, along with a bowl of lukewarm water (for moistening the rice paper rounds), and a plate covered with a wet paper towel for the completed rolls. See this site’s video for a tutorial on how to wrap your spring rolls. Beware: don’t go crazy and overfill like I tend to do! Doing so will likely create more filling on the outside than on the inside. It will take more wrappers than you expect – but I guarantee they will all be tasty (albeit messy) in the end. Be sure to cover your spring rolls with a wet paper towel until ready to serve so that the rice wrappers don’t dry out.

For serving, my favorite sauce hits almost all the taste buds: savory, sweet, sour, salty, and spicy! The main ingredients include peanut butter, hoisin sauce, lime juice, soy sauce, and sriracha. For those of you who might be unfamiliar with hoisin sauce, the Chinese word hoisin literally translates to “seafood” but there is actually no seafood in the sauce. While there are some regional variants, it is typically made with soybeans, sugar, red chilis (although it’s not spicy), garlic, and Chinese five spice. If you’re feeling particularly ambitious, you could make your own! Otherwise my favorite brand is Lee Kum Kee, which you can find at many Asian grocery stores, but any one will be good.

One last important tip: be sure to enjoy these over a plate! Between the drippy dipping sauce, slippery noodles, and pieces of fillings, things are bound to get messy. But aren’t those are the best kinds of foods? … I’ll leave you with a picture of what happens when you attempt to cut them open after overstuffing & leaving them out for awhile: super messy, yet still absolutely tasty!!

5 from 1 vote

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Vietnamese Spring Rolls with Peanut Hoisin Dipping Sauce

A cool snack for those hot summer days! The spicy hoisin-peanut sauce will get you addicted to eating these veggie-filled rolls.

Course Appetizer, Snack

Cuisine Asian

Servings 12 rolls

Ingredients

For the rolls

• 12 round rice-paper wrappers (8 inch diameter)
• 18 large shrimp (boiled until cooked through, peeled, deveined, and halved lengthwise)
• 2 Chinese sausages (cut into thin biases, cooked through, and drained on paper towels)
• 3 ounces thin dried rice-stick noodles (prepared as per package instructions, rinsed with cold water)
• 2 medium carrots, peeled into ribbons
• 2 English or Persian (seedless) cucumbers, julienned into long matchsticks
• 1 red bell pepper, julienned
• 12 leaves butter lettuce
• 2 cups fresh cilantro leaves

Other possible fillings

• tofu, prepared to your liking
• avocado, sliced
• red cabbage, shredded
• radish slices
• beet slices
• bean sprouts
• basil leaves
• chives

For the dipping sauce

• 1/2 cup natural creamy peanut butter (I prefer freshly ground, no sugar added peanut butter)
• 1/4 cup warm water
• 1/4 cup fresh lime juice (from 2 limes)
• 1 Tbsp soy sauce
• 1/2 cup hoisin sauce
• 3 Tbsp sriracha (may be omitted, lessened, or more to taste)
• 2 tsp rice vinegar (optional if you do not have any on hand)

Instructions

Spring Rolls:

1. Soak a wrapper in warm water 30 seconds; immediately lay it flat on a work surface. Lay 3 shrimp halves, cut sides up, on bottom third; top with 1/4 cup noodles, butter lettuce, a few slices of each fresh vegetable, several Chinese sausage pieces, and 2 Tbsp cilantro.

2. Fold bottom of wrapper over fillings; roll over once, tuck in sides, and roll. Place completed roll on a plate and cover with a damp paper towel.

3. Repeat to make remaining rolls. Serve with dipping sauce.

Dipping Sauce:

1. In a medium bowl, microwave the water and lime juice for approximately 30 seconds.

2. Carefully whisk the peanut butter in with the liquid, then add the remaining ingredients to taste.