Introduction
Pâté Chaud, also known as Bánh patê sô, is a savoury Vietnamese puff pastry pie with a filling consisting in onions and a choice of ground pork, chicken, or beef. As you can tell by the ingredients, this recipe is akin to a classic Western meat pastry, and in fact, it originates in French colonial Vietnam.
Today, we propose a slight variation to the traditional recipe, with two goals in mind:
accentuate the flavours of traditional Vietnamese cuisine
reduce the amount of cholesterol and fats of the classic recipe
To do so, we first opted to use chicken instead of pork. Chicken is lean meat that has half the amount of saturated fats and cholesterol than pork[1][2]. We also chose a low-fat pastry sheet to keep fats further in check.
Then, we added a selection of typical Vietnamese herbs and veggies to the filling:
Lemongrass
Bird eye chillies
Mint
We also added aubergines, which often feature in the Vietnamese cuisine, to make our filling juicier and healthier. Aubergines are a low-calorie vegetable and an excellent source of fibres and antioxidants [3].
All these ingredients bring spicy Vietnamese flavours to this otherwise western dish, and we love it! They also improve the overall nutritional profile of Bánh patê sô. Each pie has 190 calories and covers only 13% of the recommended daily intake (RDI) for fats.
Whether you know and love the traditional dish, or are just starting to explore the rich and flavourful Vietnamese cuisine, we hope you'll enjoy our spin on this famous recipe. Let's get started!