Welcome to my website. I am the author of ‘Vietnamese – Simple Vietnamese Food To Cook At Home’. I am a photographer and film maker. You can book into my supper club, Vietnamese cooking classes, buy my book, check out my photography and lots more here.
Please follow me on instagram @loveleluu – Thank you so much for visiting x
Best Food Photographer in London
The supper club is held in my home in London Fields, Hackney. It is like a dinner party in the tradition of a Vietnamese feast with homemade Vietnamese food.
Vietnamese food is about the balance of flavours, of sweet, salty and sour – there is no measuring device that can ever match your own taste buds.
Thursday night. I came back from holidaying in the South Of France to an email, saying, can you style a shoot for Bill Granger, for The Sunday Times? Hell yes! was the answer.
We share the same literary agency whose seen much of my handy work behind the camera and believed in my abilities and somehow pushed me right into the deep end with a video shoot with Bill Granger! Bill Granger!! I’ve been watching him on telly for years! I love him!
Friday. As well as cooking and hosting two supper clubs that weekend.
I cycled as fast as I could to the book shop and brought as well as study every Bill Granger book so I can grasp his style.
 |
| Background Prop Hire |
Took myself immediately to a prop house, Background Props – thanks to many of my Twitter friend’s advice (it was like being in prop heaven!!!). Got all the props together from recipes we would shoot.
Sunday. Went to the flower market. Brought tons of flowers and herbs.
Panicked. I didn’t have linen. Brought linen.
Went out drinking for the entire day at Burnt Enz and then had a mini dinner party. Chucked everyone out and stayed up till 6am gathering my own props just in case Bill needed something.
Monday.Turned up at 9, cleared clutter, set props. shoot. re set. done.
I gave Bill a bottle of pho stock. I would have given him noodles and everything too but I was more worried about me bringing an ironing board, hair dryer and all. Hope he liked it. It was an honour to work with him. Such a calm and friendly person!
In return I got some pork chops made by Bill Granger on the shoot and shared it with one of my best friends, Will, whom I went on holiday with. Yay! It was one of the best meals. I will certainly remember it for life. When I woke up on that Thursday morning in sticky hot France and took many train journeys and flew home, I had absolutely no idea, just no idea how extraordinary circumstances would lead me. So thankful!
 |
| (I know these aren’t the best plates for those chops, we just wanted to eat the food) |
So! If anyone wants me to style anything or shoot anything or light anything. I am your gal! Hit me! I was in my element! Due to being on many shoots in the past, and having done a degree in Film & Video at Central Saint Martins (where I was mostly at the pub and in New York) I love making film and taking photos.
Bill Granger’s new book EASY by Harper Collins is out. The styling in that book is incredible! As are the recipes!
 |
| pho bo |
In the first of her series of blog posts on how to cook Vietnamese food, guest blogger Uyen Luu shares the basic principles behind Vietnamese cooking.
There is a certain solitary quietness when bent over a steaming hot bowl of phó, slurping away and sucking at noodles. The broth is laced with the fragrant spices of star anise, coriander seeds, cinnamon and cloves, with top notes of fresh spring onions, coriander, basil, saw tooth herbs and lemon.
Vietnamese cuisine is one of the most flavoursome in the world, with many of its basic principles based on satisfying every taste bud. Preparing and cooking Vietnamese food is about fine tuning tasting skills to balance and master sweet, sour, salty, umani, bitter and hot flavours. It is about combining perfect textures, such as silky meat or fish with crunchy vegetables or herbs to satisfy the bite.
Vietnamese food is about accomplishing a perfect balance in taste, in texture and the lightness of being. Many people naturally follow the yin and yang principles in combining ingredients, for example, a soup with hearty ginger to warm up the body is contrasted with refreshing, cool leaves like pak choi to harmonise the feeling in your body. Eating in balance is a major factor in keeping healthy and many believe that food is medicine.
To maintain an equilibrium, plenty of refreshing shakes, like avocado, papaya, pennyswort and watermelon, are drank as snacks, especially in the evenings to freshen the body before bedtime.
Vietnam has taken much inspiration from its occupiers, especially the French. The streets are buzzing with food and its aromas, from barbecued meat-filled baguettes (bánh mì), hot pork pastries, crunchy carrot salads and beef steaks with French fries.
The famous noodle soup, phó, was influenced by French casserole pot-au-feu (pot of fire) – and you find many Vietnamese words reflect French, like pâté, pho –(feu), Bò bít têt (beef steak), pâté so (pâté chaud) or cà rôt (carrot).
Vietnamese people love eating so much that they have a term called “an choi”, which means to eat playfully, or snack. There are many small and light street food portions that you can pick up, eat and go, throughout the day. Sometimes they are even referred to as gifts to the mouth.
There isn’t a starter, main and dessert – there are snacks, meals in one dish and family meals with many plates all served at once. Vietnamese food is all about the love of food, flavour and eating. Or in other words, how food is love.
If you want to try cooking Vietnamese food at home, have a go at Uyen Luu’s Saigon summer rolls.
The Skinny Bib is one of London’s top restaurant bloggers. Thai in origin, “Perm” trots the globe for exciting culinary knowledge and brings home his blog The Skinny Bib, which is recently featured in TimeOut London, CCNGo and The Huffington Post. He is also a contributor for the Maitre D’ column of Qatar Airways Oryx in-flight magazine. I heard he is also quite nifty in the kitchen.
At Global Feast, a pop up in The Old Town Hall in Stratford at the heart of The Olympics, he and I will be creating a Vietnamese/ Thai feast on Monday 6th August 2012. This is a non profit event, to book, click here. £45
“plar plaa salmon”
– Thai -style salmon ceviche
“bun thit nuong”
– Vietnamese BBQ chargrilled pork belly with cold vermilcelli noodle salad
“kao nhiew piak lum-yai”
– syrupy sticky (black) rice pudding with coconut flesh
and longan, finished with salty & sweet coconut milk.
 |
| Salmon En Croute from Donald Russell, photo by Danny McCubbin |
I have been doing supper clubs for a few years now for perfect strangers. Some I have become great friends with and some return every now and again and some I may never see again. I really felt like doing a dinner party, not a supper club but a dinner party like the ones I used to do and join in on some of the fun. I didn’t want to spend the whole night in the kitchen but actually be with my friends. So I invited 20 friends over for dinner. Little did they know, I didn’t actually cook anything because Donald Russell sent me all the food.
I went to visit Donald Russell a few months ago in Aberdeen and met Stefan Kolsh, Head Chef of Donald Russell’s ready meals and was lucky enough to taste the entire collection with him. He discussed about his painstaking experiments to keep the food fresh, how things react when frozen and defrosted and how ingredients change after a certain time and how he used the best and the right ingredients to make everything ultra delicious!
 |
| Canape selection |
 |
| sausage rolls |
I ordered my favourite things, and they sent me three huge boxes of food, all I needed to do was to put them in the oven to heat up. Genius! Of course, all of my friends deserve more than just ready meals but these aren’t no ordinary ready meals, they are Donald Russell ready meals and we got a range from sausage rolls, salmon en croute, beef wellington, lasagne to a selection of my favourite curries! All tasting incredibly homemade. I saw them more as a catering service for my party.
We ended up having a great time over dinner, which was the most important thing for me. The whole purpose of this was so that I can take a rest from cooking and enjoy food with my guests.
 |
| photo by Donald Russell |
Donald Russell sends everything frozen, (packed beautifully), so you must give yourself some time to defrost some of the products. All the instructions are clear on the labels. We all favourited everything although some friends were suspicious that I could bake so well (I can’t). They all thought the meat in the beef wellington was incredible, there is no doubt about the quality of the meat at Donald Russell. The Queen orders from them!
The meal was complimentary, kindly supplied by Donald Russell. If I were to have another one of these dinner parties where I don’t want to cook, I am highly likely to reorder the sausage rolls, (great as a canape), the beef wellington, lasagne and all of the curries (even to have as meals for one in front of Eastenders). The cheesecake selection too! Highly recommended!
You can order online here
www.donaldrussell.com
http://www.donaldrussell.com/simplicity/ready-meals.html
I will be doing a cooking demonstration at The Vietnam Festival on Saturday 14th July at 12:30, Spitalfields. For more details and a recipe for Saigon summer rolls, see here
As also seen in The Evening Standard
The Evening Standard: Hot Dinner/ Summer Rolls Recipe
