Fish sauce!

I hate the fact that I cannot make the same fish sauce my mother makes. Its either too weak or strong, never perfect.

Vietnamese Fish Sauce (VSF) is largely a mix of Water, Concentrated Fish Sauce, Sugar and Lemon/Lime Juice. This is roughly similar to the fish sauce made by the Laotian and Thai people.

Now the formula is different across cultures, tastes and purpose. One of my favourite dishes is Spring rolls with Vermicelli, Lettuce, Carrots, Mint and Fish Sauce.

In this dish, what makes the dish is the spring rolls and the fish sauce. The dish will always fail if any one of these components is lacking. And tonite I have to say my fish sauce let me down.

It was disappointing, the spring rolls were excellent; crunchy, soft on the inside and especially tasty since mum made them and I just cooked them as per required.

Regardless the fish sauce was horrible as it was way to weak and rather then have the sweet yet fishy flavour compliment that rest of the dish; it left me feeling annoyed and unsatisfied.

End Rant

Sometimes you just have to tell the worlds or woes!