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“For me, the ethos of Southern Vietnamese food, of what I do, is heavily ingrained in my style of eating – just very light food and a lot of raw vegetables,” says .
The chef currently runs and in Melbourne and believes veggies, herbs, simplicity and generosity are at the centre of comforting, mood-lifting meals.
Mounds of vegetables and the smell of spices
Food has always been a big part of her family gatherings and Vietnamese-style wrap banquets are something they've often enjoyed.
“I love that it’s interactive and super light. My family has always leaned into this kind of eating. Mum grows everything in the backyard, so literally, we’ll get all the fresh herbs and lettuce five minutes before using them," the chef says.
“Images of our family table always include mounds of fresh vegetables and, instead of a small plate of herbs to go with the dishes, we have a basket!”
Another favourite memory for Le? The smells coming from her mum’s kitchen as she walked home from school.
“Even if I was still a couple of blocks away from home, I could already smell the spices and aromatics from the soup mum was making. It was in the air," the chef says. “Mum was a single mother, and she was really the main cook, but our entire family was almost always in the kitchen.”
Simplicity and comfort
In the kitchen with her mum, Le learned how to make spring rolls, tie knots in lily flower pods, and cook simple, restorative food.
“ would be a favourite, of course. It’s nourishing and comforting. It just warms up the body," she says. “When I was younger, pho was my go-to food for a hangover. For everyone else, it would be bacon and eggs, but for me it would be pho.” Le laughs at the memory.
These days, the chef might be busy running her restaurants Jeow and Ca Com with partner Jia-Yen Lee, but she goes back to the kind of simple, wholesome food she enjoyed as a child.
“We’re always on the go, so at the end of the week, we try to eat a lot of vegetables. Or we’ll do a fried egg omelette with , a stir-fry with Filipino , a really simple soup with , snow pea sprouts or whatever vegetables," she says. “Just the simplest food can give you the most comfort.”
How food brings people together
The way you serve food also matters.
“In my family and culture, like in how we do food in the restaurant, there’s always a lot of generosity," she says. “You should leave a restaurant full; so our dishes at the restaurant are generally a bit more generous than other restaurants of our kind of calibre.”
Even if I was still a couple of blocks away from home, I could already smell the spices and aromatics from the soup mum was making.
And the lessons the chef learned in her mum’s kitchen still persist today.
“The meaning of food has never changed for me. It got me to move into this career – I’ve seen how food brings people together. It doesn’t matter what side of the world you’re on or what language you speak, we find the most comfort when we find good, nourishing food.”
