Dinner and a book is supported by the Rex and Alice A. Martin Foundation of Elkhart, celebrating the spirit of Alice Martin and her love of good food and good friends.

The country of Vietnam was in the news for many years during the 1960s and 70s and left a long, deep shadow on our country and its image in the world.

The Chinese and French had been defeated by the Vietnamese and had warned Americans not to get involved in Vietnam.

Let's meet my guest to find out how American women became involved in the book The Women by Kristin Hanna.

My guest is Jackie Hughes.

Welcome, Jackie.

Well, thank you, Gail.

Good to have you back.

Hey, it's always a pleasure.

We travel around.

Oh, we?

Yes we do.

We go to Afghanistan, and then we're now in Vietnam.

And, I, I found it a very interesting book.

And it does make you feel so discouraged about the fact that women nurses did not get any kind of recognition.

And our main character is what's her name?

And what what is her position?

Francis.

But she's called Frankie.

Frankie?

Yes.

And she comes from very wealthy family.

And she has been kind of pampered, and she has done what she wanted.

And she grew up in California, and, her brother enlists to go to the Vietnam War.

And she.

Where does she do?

She felt compelled to join him and felt it was her duty.

Her duty as, if he's there.

She wanted to be there with him.

And, it's interesting I was drawn to this book because my aunt served in two wars, is an army nurse, and, she served in both the Second World War and the Korean conflict or the Korean War.

So she was familiar with the Asian Pacific.

That's where she served.

But it's these were valiant women all through the service.

They were.

And they gave up their lives.

They dedicated their lives to saving lives.

And yet they were overlooked.

And it just this happened not only do during my aunts period, but it went on to this Vietnam conflict.

Yes.

And you know, that misogyny, the fact that these women suffered and really risked their lives, they were very valiant, very dedicated, but they never got the recognition.

No, they didn't.

And so, we are in this book.

We are in Vietnam, we start in California, and we go with her to Vietnam.

And let's talk about, first of all, we've got all kinds of colorful things here.

Let's talk about our food and what you're going to make and what I'm going to make of a Viet Vietnamese salad.

It's a little bit spicy.

As Vietnamese, Vietnamese, Vietnamese food often is, and, they always use so many vegetables.

And yes, it's a very healthy.

Yes it is.

Yes.

So we are making vegetables here.

You've got a nice salad.

And you.

Hey, I notice that people are using these, I think I have one is, these.

Well, actually, what I used to say this with.

They have these graters, but I use a little.

I use a little spiral cut since I don't have one these you know.

So then I had one at home, and I was so pleased.

I.

You do it on a carrot and you have.

You have nice strips.

Look at this and you can put that in the salad and you can put it on top of a dish.

I just think they're marvelous.

Anyway, I interrupt, so you're making this Vietnamese salad?

I am, and, of course, can't do anything without noodles.

Right, right, right.

And and these are I.

This is a a rice vermicelli.

Yes.

So really this this recipe starts with your noodles and it's simple because what I'm going to do is put these in a bowl and then you just let them soak with boiling water they'll soften.

So just let them soak for about 4 or 5 minutes.

You don't want them to get mushy.

Well and they cook so fast.

You could actually just put, noodles in a bowl of, hot water.

You could do four minutes in there, It's it is amazing to me.

So I just I'm using the bowl just out of, Convenience, of course.

And I'm going to come back in here after you have, have these these are I love this.

This is my favorite Vietnamese dish.

And I, I met it in this, and I have, I, we go to a restaurant in South Bend, a Vietnamese restaurant on Grape Road.

Every so often when we have a taste of longing for this national dish of Vietnam.

And they even served it on the plane in the morning when we were flying out to go to Singapore.

It was, it was so interesting.

And this can be served with tofu.

You give infinity Fry some tofu.

I have some chicken pieces.

The first morning I was in Hanoi, they brought this far to me at the table and there was a pork chop in there.

That was their meat for the day was the the pork chop.

And I thought, well, this is sort of interesting, isn't it?

I am heating up some, onion here and.

Some ginger.

And we will let that cook for a little bit, and then I will put it in here, I will add some chicken broth.

Then we're going to add our, spices.

This has a lot of spices ginger sticks cinnamon cloves.

Coriander and some red pepper flakes.

And that is basically what you do.

And then I'll just add some chicken pieces to.

And then we will serve.

When we serve it we serve a little a dish of these mung beans.

And some, little slices of lime.

Sinhala pino.

And this is this has to be included.

This is Saroja.

So it has moments of really spicy flavors in this soup.

And, I was watching a woman eat with chopsticks.

She was a woman who obviously knew how to do this.

She had on a white sweater, and she had that nice little spoon you use.

You often see, Asian, restaurants.

And she would take her chopsticks and just pull the noodles out of the water, put them in this little, little spoon sort of thing and just pick it up gently.

And and she didn't drop a spot of this on her white sweater.

I was watching.

That's impressive.

That's very impressive.

So I am letting this cook a little bit and this will be streamed out.

And then we're going to add.

Some, chicken broth.

So we can get the the spices cooking.

we're infusing this chicken broth with some, Onion.

And we have ginger, and I'm doing about four cups, and I can I can guess just about that much.

Four cups.

We're going to let that cook a little bit.

And when we.

We will strain this because you don't want these, these bits and pieces of, burnt, onion and the burnt, ginger.

You want the smoky a little bit of a smoky taste, but not a burnt taste.

And so, and this has so many ingredients, and then I'm going to add the sticks.

When I put it in the, the other pan, we're going to put in all of these sauces, in this bigger pan.

And, we're going to add, I have to wait until this heats up a little bit, but we're going to add a lot of, herbs, and spices, coriander and cloves.

These this is the whole food from that part of the world, the spices, the trips that were taken to that part of the world for special spices.

They are all going in these dishes.

The same with if you have Indonesian cooking or Thai cooking.

They all use a bit of the same, the same array of foods.

And particularly I love the spices of that part of the world.

So you're shaking something?

I'm shaking the fish sauce.

I'm going to try to get a half a cup going here.

I smell that.

Drained the noodles and they're ready to go.

I've soften them, drain them, put them back in the bowl.

So the dressing is.

There's a half a cup of fish sauce.

I'm going to take a half a cup of rice vinegar.

I need a little more fish sauce.

We don't want to be short on the fish sauce.

And then I can smell the sweet.

It's a sweet smell.

The rice vinegar is.

Yes.

And these are all these are all wonderful additions to your kitchen.

And if you like this kind of cuisine, you want these bottles in your drawers, in your, not your drawers or cabinets, because, this is what that part of the world uses.

And to me it is, are just divine.

So what I'm going to do now, this has been cooking a little bit.

Now I'm going to strain this back into a bigger pot.

Now, see, Jack used used, That went everywhere, didn't it, Jackie used hers.

And she's using hers for a sauce.

For the salad.

And I have some little dishes here.

I'm kind of gathering some of these things.

Around the dish so that we can use these things when we make the, Oh.

We got a little flame going on here.

I think we should do something about that.

Oh, there we go.

I think I'm going to bring it to the forward one.

Who had the little shower?

So.

And I have certain things ready for serving.

Now, we're going to take a little break.

I'm going to show you some pictures of Jackie's aunt, who was a nurse, and, she she was in what country?

She served in these, Second World War in the Pacific and then the Korean War or conflict in North Korea.

So she was a bit of a nurse, like the one we have here, our our heroine.

And so we're going to see those pictures when we come back.

We're going to continue on with our our Vietnamese lunch or dinner.

We'll be right back.

And our book today is The Women by Kristin Hannah.

Jackie is.

Jackie Hughes is making a wonderful, Vietnamese salad and I am working on my soup here.

My pho I'm adding some cinnamon sticks to the broth, and I'm going to add, cloves.

This really gives it a nice flavor.

Oh, this is so interesting because it's brand new and it hasn't been opened.

Isn't that something?

So put in a clover two and the.

You think, well, what is what is this?

Is this like a mulled wine?

No, it it's just a soup is a soup base.

And you can in some stores you can buy.

I think it depends on where you're living in Washington, D.C., you can get these cartons of broth and it's pho So it's.

Oh, this is already been prepared.

Well how convenient.

Yes, very, very convenient.

But we don't have that here.

And so we have to make it ourselves a little bit of, oh I have a ginger.

Let's have some coriander.

Do you ever use coriander on your slice?

Cooked, carrots or potatoes.

It's really, really good.

Well, and I've made the dressing for this.

They drain the noodles.

They're softened, and the dressing really consists of some of the fish.

Fish sauce, the rice vinegar, a little bit of red pepper.

You have to have acid.

And then I had sugar and garlic already in the jar.

So one of these to blend these.

Ingredients, let them sit for a little while.

And you have I'm going to put in some red pepper too.

You know I've noticed a lot of different cuisines that use a little shake of red pepper sometimes.

Yes, I do, and, it's really interesting as well as garlic.

Yes.

It's very there are very few dishes that don't come in cultures that I'm trying to think of.

People don't use garlic.

There's very few.

Well, and, you know, when I was growing up in Elkhart, Indiana, nobody used garlic.

It was not in the, in the repertoire, although the Italian families did.

But oh, yes.

Yes, in general, there was no garlic, and oh, these, these nice little these are all done.

Well, you don't find it in English or, Great Britain cooking or Irish cooking.

You don't usually find garlic in their cuisine normally.

That I know of, but it doesn't say there's no I've seen it.

It's just sort of it has moved into that realm of interesting food.

It's in so many things and well, you know, the the world is smaller, Gail.

All it is, we're all wanted to try this one is, I think, what bland food we ate when we were little kids.

All right.

Now my rice is cooked.

And what I would do when they bring it to you in the restaurant, they can serve it so many ways.

You can have your own bowl in which you have your, vermicelli, as you called it, and then.

You have this wonderful broth.

And I'm going to put some chicken in here, cut up chicken in this just to heat it through.

And.

This is the pho part right here.

And I was even putting in some little carrot pieces.

Yes.

We've got to cloves So.

And then you can add in basil to your soup or I have cilantro.

And then another way you can do it and I will do that is, put it as a decoration at the very end.

Now, this is kind of hot.

So what I'm going to do now, I'm assuming that we are at the table and usually there is a big bowl like this served with.

The noodles.

I think I better get a cloth to pick that up or we'll have a surprising accident.

Well, I'm adding to the salad a, surprisingly, the sale.

It has a a lot of cucumber.

They say to see the cucumber I love by the seedless.

Yes, yes, you do buy those English.

Yes, yes, that's what I did because it's seeding the cucumbers.

And so this has you can see it has a great assortment.

We have bamboo bamboo shoots or, bamboo shoots, bean sprouts.

Excuse me.

I was thinking of bean sprouts.

A large cucumber.

And I buy the seedless, but we also have celery, celery and no celery.

Excuse me.

We have carrots, and I'm going to add some green onions.

So really, the vegetables in this are bean sprouts, carrots, cucumber, green onion.

I think this is really good.

Now, did you find this on the internet?

Did you?

I did find this on the internet.

As a matter of fact.

And I looked at a lot of recipes and I tried this and it's wonderful in the summer.

It's really a great summer dish.

And it is has it, as we say, it's a side that you can use for any Vietnamese meal.

And here we go.

We finally got that off.

Now this is steaming.

This is how it would be served.

Although I will take out these, sticks.

Cinnamon sticks.

Oh, that looks wonderful to me.

It is ideal.

And I can smell.

It was so fragrant.

So now you would be served a little dish alongside of your soup.

Now, this is a large, obviously soup bowl.

But my husband and I often share one because we we may not want all of that.

We want to have a second dish, but we would squeeze some lime juice in here.

And have a second.

And a lot of this is depending on your taste and how you like things to taste.

But they do serve it with lime.

And then bean sprouts like this on top.

This is served right alongside.

And you put it in here.

Now my husband and I like this hot sauce.

It's the siracha sauce.

And we have to always test this bean.

Right now this might taste like a furnace, but oh.

And we would probably add some, some slivers of jalapeño.

So you see there's a lot of hot ingredients and you're thinking, oh, I can't eat stuff like that.

Yes you can, you can try it.

It's wonderful.

I would say this is my favorite soup.

So let's say you're here.

You're going to order pho.

You could have it brought in a big bowl like this.

My husband and I have it divided into two smaller bowls.

Then we have our cilantro.

And that's on the top.

So you can just imagine the amazing flavors that you get out of this soup.

And it's p h o and it's pronounced fa.

And we pronounced so many different ways the wrong way in Vietnam.

They just sort of stared at us.

They weren't sure what we wanted.

We were so, so full.

And I know it's FA and somebody else might call and say, no, it's not that.

It's this.

There's a lot of controversy in the way this is pronounced, but this is my favorite Vietnamese soup with chicken noodles, bean sprouts, squirt of lime and all these wonderful herbs you just added.

And that is so far.

And yours.

It's interesting.

Gail, because this also calls for finishing touches of cilantro.

And I will know I've tossed in this salad dressing and then I'll now squeeze the lime over it.

Oh, this is divine.

Do that call for any sugar.

It does.

So I had in the jar there's three tablespoons of sugar.

You have the rice vinegar.

The fish sauce, the sugar garlic and then the, red pepper.

Okay, Jackie you can open a little shop.

I kind of have this in your shop.

Really.

So it really makes a a lovely bright, zesty salad.

Of course, the, the characters in the book in Vietnam, I couldn't find C rations, so.

Right, right.

They well, you know, they were relying on, C rations quite often.

But when they went into the villages, this would be the type of food that these years you have this done just in time.

Do you have something more?

You're going to.

And no, that isn't right.

That's going to come here in our place of honor.

We're going to take a quick break.

We're going to add all this together.

Put it up here to serve where you're invited to come for their Vietnamese lunch.

And so we'll first we're going to show you some artwork done by Vietnamese artists.

And then we'll be right back.

And we are having our Vietnamese drink here.

Yes we are.

What is it?

It's a it's a coconut milk beverage.

And coconut milk is really a lot of their drinks include coconut milk.

And their stews too.

Yes.

They use a lot of coconut milk.

Yeah.

And you'll see the vendors carrying coconuts on there, you know, with their little.

Scooters and well you know, backs on their packs on their back.

The Indian you know India has a lot of coconut milk.

Yes.

And then you have all of the islands where the people went to find the spices to take back to Europe.

They have the spices, they have coconuts and they make dessert.

I don't think we use it that much, do we?

Not to the degree, but it's it's becoming increasingly it's again isn't into our repertoire.

Yes.

Yeah.

So it's tasty and and I know it's sweet so I wouldn't have problems with the milk here, it would be because it's from a coconut.

There's no I can't drink cows.

Yeah, I'm just lactose free.

So this is lactose free people.

Okay.

And let's look again at this wonderful food.

Look at that great salad that Jackie made.

And we just have for decor here.

Some of the items that we used in our cooking.

Here's my pho and I would serve it with chopsticks.

And of course I like a big spoon and a fork.

So I kind of let myself be known that I can't have chopsticks.

I mean, they fly out of my hand across the room, but I love this this food.

Jackie, what was your favorite part of the book?

Really it was it was just the fact that it brought home the fact that these women were really not paid any attention to.

Yes, she came back from the war.

She was a hero in her own right.

These women, they didn't bear arms, but they saved arms.

They certainly did.

And she just wasn't recognized, nor were her colleagues.

And her father was very emphatic about the fact that that she doesn't get up on the wall of recognition.

And she has a lot of problems.

She has post, she had post traumatic stress and stress and, and she suffered greatly as many as fellow vets do.

And so she it really did stress that these women underwent the same stresses that their male counterparts did.

Yes, but but they were not recognized for it.

And I'm getting the sign that we are our story of Vietnam and Vietnamese cooking is coming to an end, but she'll never end for me because I love it and I don't think I'll ever get back there.

But I enjoyed my two weeks in Vietnam and I encourage you to go.

It's an eye opening experience.

Jackie, thank you for joining us today.

And, we especially are glad that you joined us and stay with us.

We'll be back next week.

And remember, good food, good friends, good books, good books make for a very good life.

We'll see you next time.

This WNIT Local production has been made possible in part by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Dinner and a book is supported by the Rex and Alice A. Martin Foundation of Elkhart, celebrating the spirit of Alice Martin and her love of good food and good friends.