Viet Kieu adj., noun: Person of Vietnamese ancestry living abroad; foreigner in a familiar country.
Viet Kieu is a vital, extraordinary cookbook that explores the heart of Vietnamese food and cooking techniques, as interpreted by acclaimed chef Thi Le. Thi is a self-described viet kieu who has spent her life navigating her place across two worlds while never feeling truly at home in either one. The movement between the two is what defines her remarkable approach to ingredients and flavour.
From classics like Cháo gà (Chicken congee) and the southern-influenced Can chau chanh dây (Sweet & sour fish soup with passionfruit), to a vibrant Prawn goi salad with a nuoc mam dressing, and the basics for fermenting Com me (sour rice), along with communal feasts like a Viet Cajun seafood boil-up and the beloved leafy 'Wrappy guy', each of this book's 100-plus recipes reflect Thi's unending appetite for food that is alive with freshness, a relentless curiosity and an uncompromising desire to distil the cuisine of her heritage through a modern lens.
Viet Kieu also tells the compelling story of a girl raised in outer western Sydney in a home where narratives of upward mobility were absent. Where a safe identity felt elusive. It's a tale of hardship, deep resilience, cooking as a life raft, a groundbreaking restaurant in Melbourne – and fierce love too.
Thi Bich Phuong Le is a Melbourne-based chef-restaurateur of Vietnamese descent. She runs two small restaurants, Anchovy and Jeow, in inner-Melbourne's Richmond, and a banh mi bar called Ca Com with her partner Jia-Yen Lee and their spoodle Cheddar Cheese.