One of my favorite foods to order when I don’t want to cook is bánh mi from a local Vietnamese restaurant in my neighborhood. I’ll boldly say it’s my favorite sandwich. And what’s not to love about a super crispy baguette spread with paté, then topped with sliced meat, pickled carrots, pickled daikon radish, fresh cilantro, fresh cucumbers, plus mayo and sometimes jalapeños.
Bánh mi has all the flavor components that I want all the time in other foods: it’s savory, spicy, sweet, perfectly creamy and oh-so meaty. Luckily, cookbook author, food blogger and content creator Kristina Cho is right there with me. She recently posted a video of herself making not a bánh mi sandwich, but a banh mi pasta salad. The Vietnamese-inspired recipe comes from her gorgeous 2024 cookbook, Chinese Enough, and I know I’m going to be making this all summer long.
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@eatchofood Banh Mi Pasta Salad is on pg. 164 of my cookbook, Chinese Enough! #asianfood #pastasalad #easyrecipe #cookingvideo #foodtiktok #recipesoftiktok
♬ Wes Anderson-esque Cute Acoustic – Kenji Ueda
Why Bánh Mi Pasta Salad Makes So Much Sense
Bánh mi is a prime candidate for pasta salad-ification. As Cho writes in Chinese Enough, “just like the sandwich, this dish is creamy, spicy, tart, and refreshing all at once, in perfect measure. It’s reminiscent of Hawaiian mac salad, but just a little more vibrant.”
Cho adds tons of vegetables—pickled carrots and daikon radish, red onion, jalapeño, cilantro—to the pasta salad to reflect the fresh fillings in a bánh mi sandwich. Paté and sliced meat usually provide the umami-richness in a banh mi sandwich, but because paté isn’t the easiest ingredient to source, Cho bumps up the umami by adding tons of fish sauce and oyster sauce to the mayo-based dressing. Like a fresh bánh mi wrapped in parchment paper begging you to dive in, Cho’s pasta salad is the complete package.
Pro-tip directly from Cho, “If you want to be everyone’s favorite friend, consider making a double batch so guests can take a container home.”
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How to Make Bánh Mi Pasta Salad
You can find the recipe for bánh mi pasta salad in Chinese Enough, but here’s the gist. To make it, you’ll need fusilli pasta (or another short, cut pasta), roughly chopped pickles (or pickled carrots and daikon, if you have them), minced red onion, chopped fresh cilantro, minced jalapēno, mayo (preferably Kewpie), fish sauce, oyster sauce, sriracha, kosher salt and white pepper.
Start by bringing a large pot of water to a boil over high heat. Add the pasta and cook to al dente. Drain the pasta and rinse under cold water. In a large bowl, combine the cooked pasta, pickles, onion, cilantro, jalapeño, mayo, fish sauce, oyster sauce, sriracha, salt and white pepper. Give everything a good stir to make sure the pasta is evenly coated. Cover the salad and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours before serving.
This salad goes well with pretty much anything you’re cooking on the grill—chicken, burgers, pork chops, kebabs. Leftovers hold well, so you might want to consider chopping up any leftover meat from the grill and adding it to the pasta salad for lunch the next day.
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