Vietnamese Bread Recipe Rice Flour

The bread with which the banh mi sandwich is made is one of the many legacies of France which was once Vietnam's colonizer. To the uninitiated, the Vietnamese baguette may simply look like a smaller replica of its French ancestor. It is not. The Vietnamese baguette is lighter, airier and the crust is thinner, lightly crisp and crackly.

Banh mi is inexpensive and so widely available in Vietnam that even sellers of banh mi sandwiches rarely bake their own bread. But for those who want to try their hand at making Vietnamese baguettes at home, a few pointers will definitely help out. 

Banh mi dough. This claim is false. While some recipes do include rice flour, not all of them do and they all seem to have the same signature texture.

Banh Mi (vietnamese Baguette) Recipe

As you explore banh mi recipes, you'll find that many simply use all-purpose flour while others do combine it with rice flour. Very few use bread flour or other types, so that is not a requirement either.

Another common claim is that the dough must rise at a specific temperature. This is true in the sense that the rising time is directly affected by the room temperature. It's something that all bakers have to contend with for yeasted bread and rising times will often change with the seasons.

Dough rises better and faster in a warm environment. If your kitchen is cold, you can try to heat the room or leave the dough to rise in the warmest area. Ideally, a room temperature of 70 to 77 F should be the goal, but that can be difficult to regulate in some kitchens at certain times of the year.

Banh Mi Bread Buying Tips

To make it easier and do this on a small scale, you can place the shaped dough inside the oven and put a bowl of steaming water underneath. Close the oven door tightly so the warmth is trapped inside.

For the Vietnamese baguette,  there is a specific way to shape the dough. It isn't enough that the dough is formed into a log and this particular shape may contribute to the texture.

Many cooks who have tried baking Vietnamese baguette say that the dough must be flattened then rolled jellyroll style, before rolling into a log with tapered ends. Others flatten the dough then fold it like a big envelope before proceeding to form it into a log.

How To Make Bánh Mì (vietnamese Baguette)

In addition to the three items above, if you want perfect baguettes, you'll need to add steam to a very hot oven. This is probably the final piece to the puzzle and possibly the true key to the bread's success and appeal.

Unlike many bread recipes, which use an oven temperature around 375 F, these baguettes must be baked at a high temperature of 450 F. It's also crucial to place a bowl of steaming water underneath the loaf. Additionally, the loaves should be lightly sprayed with water two to three times during the first half of the baking time, which is typically 30 minutes.

If you forget these final tips, you'll have a nice baguette, but it will not be banh mi. The sprayed water helps crisp up the crust and it's possible that the steam affects the bread's airiness.

Vietnamese Donuts (banh Cam Banh Vong)

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You may know Bánh Mì as the delicious, herb and veggie-filled, savory sandwich that is a staple in Vietnamese restaurants. But the word “Bánh Mì” in Vietnamese actually means bread, derived from ”Bánh” which refers primarily to baked goods. In Vietnamese cuisine, it’s also used to refer to the short baguette that is used to make the Bánh Mì sandwich. That light and crispy Vietnamese bread is what I’m going to be focusing on in this banh mi bread recipe.

Vietnam was colonized by the French for six decades and this has had a very noticeable influence on Vietnamese food. You may notice a lot of similarities between Vietnamese and French cuisine that you don’t see in the food of many other Asian countries. Some examples of this are Vietnamese coffee and Vietnamese flan – both very delicious.

How To Make Banh Mi Bread Recipe

But probably the most popular example is the Vietnamese baguette or the Bahn Mi. This Vietnamese version of the French sandwich bread has a crisp, thin crust with a delightfully cottony soft and chewy inside. It’s also a little bit sweeter than the European baguette, which makes it a great base for all the delicious Vietnamese herbs and savory flavors in a Bánh Mì sandwich!

The process of making Vietnamese baguettes versus French baguettes is also a bit different. While the French baguette uses a more delicate rolling and shaping process, Vietnamese baguettes typically require more speed and more force. In this banh mi bread recipe, I use a stand mixer to get the same effect. This treatment of the dough allows more gluten to develop for the ideal chewy texture.

The secret to making the perfect Vietnamese baguette is in the kind of flour used. The easiest and best way to get that authentic Vietnamese baguette taste and texture is to use bread flour instead of regular all-purpose flour. Bread flour has more protein and gluten. The extra protein gives the bread more rise and the extra gluten gives it more chew. This is what creates the much lighter and chewier texture that is unique to the Vietnamese baguette.

Bánh Bò Hấp (vietnamese Steamed Rice Cake)

The brand of bread flour I like best for this recipe is King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour, but you can use any unbleached bread flour available to you. Unbleached flour is slightly denser than bleach flour which makes it perfect for creating a sturdy bread that can hold in a lot of fillings. You might also be interested to know that unbleached flour is a little bit healthier too since it hasn’t been chemically processed as much as bleached flour has.

Using the right kind of flour really makes a big difference when it comes to baking, especially in a recipe that requires very few ingredients like this bread.

In Vietnamese, the word BánhMì is derived from ”Bánh” which refers primarily to baked goods including bread. These Vietnamesebaguettes are deliciously light and crispy that is inspired by French Baguettes, a legacy from the French Colonization.  But the Vietnamese BánhMì baguette differs in taste and texture.  The Vietnamese version is a lot lighter and airier in texture on the inside.  And the outside is lighter and crispier in texture. 

Vietnamese Steamed Rice Cakes Bánh Bèo

Keyword asian dishes, Baguette Recipe, Banh Mi Baguette, Bread Recipe, Healthy Asian recipes, Tasty Little Dumpling, Vietnamese Baguette, Vietnamese Baguette Recipe, Vietnamese Baguette Recipe, Vietnamese Baguette, Baguette Recipe, Bread Recipe, Banh Mi Baguette, Tasty Little Dumpling, Asian dishes, Healthy Asian recipes, Vietnamese Bread, Vietnamese BreadThis recipe for Homemade Banh Mi Baguette yields a soft and fluffy bread with a crusty exterior, perfect for banh mi sandwiches. With a few ingredients, you can easily make this Vietnamese staple at home.

In the 1950's, the banh mi (that we associate with today) was created in Saigon, and thus named banh mi Sai gon.

It's been long purported that rice flour is used in banh mi baguettes to give a lighter crumb. This is not necessarily true.

Bánh đúc Nóng • Savory Rice Flour Pudding

If you don't have a baguette pan, shape the dough onto a rice flour covered-towel, and create a couche /well for each baguette for proofing.

Or bread/baking lame is required to make sharp slashes on the tops of the loaves, which prevent the bread from exploding or being mis-shapened.

That is in addition to a large pan filled with hot water that will sit on the bottom of the oven floor.

How To Make Vietnamese Baguettes

Knead the dough until it is smooth and elastic, at least 10 minutes on a stand mixer at speed 3 or 4 (depending on your mixer's horsepower).

The dough is ready when you can stretch a little bit of the dough between your fingers and it creates a thin windowpane.

Make a swift yet controlled slash at a 45 degree angle on each baguette with a sharp knife or baking lame (Step 4).

Low Fodmap Rice Flour Yeast Bread

Bake for a total of 22 minutes. Every 2 minutes, open the oven door and spray the baguettes with water, until 6 minutes have elapsed (do this 3 times, every 2 minutes).

When there is 10 minutes left in the baking time, carefully remove the roasting pan with hot water