I had thit nuong on bun (rice noodles) and com (broken rice) and this delicious and understated restaurant called YANY cafe that's in the same Norcross shopping center as Hong Kong Market, Bento Box, and Happy Valley. Thit nuong literally means "grilled pork" and this was super-delicious: sweet and savory, chewy, and a little crunchy from the blackened bits. I wanted to replicate it.
When I was at the bank I noticed that the teller's last name was Nguyen and I decided to be social. I asked her about it and she told me what her recipe was: she said that she marinated the pork shoulder (and I think it has to be shoulder or else it's just too lean) in pureed lemon grass, shallot, and fish sauce for three days to infuse the proper flavor. This was the recipe I attempted, after painstakingly chilling and slicing a pork shoulder into 1/4" slices. I pureed the lemon grass, shallots, sugar, and fish sauce and mixed it in with the sliced pork and let it marinate overnight.
The right tool for the grilling is one of those flat grilling baskets. Lacking one, I painstakingly threaded the pork onto skewers, ribbon-like. They grilled on my primo over direct heat and turned out delicious. "Oh my god!" said my nine year old as he ate it. I said it too! However, the meat was very pale and not deep brown like the thit nuong at YANY. I realized that I had neglected to add the Vietnamese soy sauce to the marinade. (Vietnamese soy sauce is soy sauce + nuoc mau (Vietnamese caramel sauce)). We had it over noodles the first day, and then in Vietnamese bread for banh mi the next day and it was awesome both times.
When I saw Ms. Nguyen again I mentioned that the thit nuong was delicious but pale, and she said that she had the same problem. She told me that I should add oyster sauce to the marinate, and she complained with some embarrassment that her Thai-food-eating white friends even criticized her own thit nuong for being "too pale".
When I get the recipe just right, I will post it here. It's awesome.
