How to make com tam with grilled pork chop: tender, fragrant, neither dry nor burnt

An appealing plate of com tam needs rice that is loose but not dry, a golden-brown chop with just enough charred edge and flesh that is still moist, a clear sweet-and-sour fish sauce, and green, fragrant spring onion oil. This recipe covers the whole thing for six servings: marinating the chops, cooking broken rice, making the pickles, and grilling safely.

Quick facts

• Serves: 6 plates.
• Preparation: 50 minutes.
• Marinating: 4-8 hours in the fridge.
• Cooking and grilling: 45 minutes.
• Difficulty: medium.

Main ingredients

• 6 pork chops, 180-220 g each, 1.5-2 cm thick.
• 600 g of broken rice; the amount of water depends on the rice.
• 3 stalks of lemongrass, 5 shallots, 4 cloves of garlic.
• 45 ml of fish sauce, 20 ml of cooking oil, 20 ml of honey.
• 20 g of sugar, 15 ml of soy sauce optional, black pepper.
• Cucumber, tomato, spring onion; 6 eggs optional.

Pickles and dipping sauce

• 150 g of carrot, 150 g of white radish.
• 80 ml of rice vinegar, 70 g of sugar, 6 g of salt, 100 ml of water.
• 60 ml of fish sauce, 60-80 g of sugar, 180 ml of warm water, lime, garlic and chilli.

Choosing and preparing the chops

Choose chops with a natural pink colour, a thin rim of fat and evenly thick flesh. A bone-in chop has more flavour, but you have to check the temperature in the thick part next to the bone. If a chop is uneven, flatten the thick part gently with a meat mallet or the base of a pot, without smashing it. Score the fat rim in two or three shallow cuts so the chop does not curl on the grill.

Do not rinse the meat under a strong tap; pat it dry and remove any bone fragments with clean kitchen paper. Frozen meat should be thawed in the fridge. Chop the tender part of the lemongrass very fine, chop the shallot and garlic, and squeeze out some of the juice if you want less charring on the surface; the lemongrass solids can still be used, but scrape most of them off before grilling.

Mixing a balanced marinade

Mix 45 ml of fish sauce, the honey, 10 g of sugar, the soy sauce, the oil, the lemongrass, the shallot and garlic and the pepper. Taste the marinade before it touches the meat so you can adjust it; once it has been mixed with raw meat, do not taste it again. Marinate the chops in a sealed container for 4-8 hours in the fridge, turning them once. Do not leave them for days, as the salt changes the texture of the meat and the lemongrass loses its freshness.

Honey gives a good colour but burns easily, so do not increase it at will. Without honey, use an equivalent amount of sugar and add a spoonful of water. Never pour raw marinade over grilled meat; if you want a glazing sauce, keep a clean portion aside beforehand or boil the marinade thoroughly.

Making crisp pickles

Cut the carrot and radish into medium strips, toss them with 6 g of salt, leave them for 15 minutes, then squeeze them lightly, rinse quickly and wring them out. Mix the vinegar, 30 g of sugar and 100 ml of water, and pour it over to cover. Leave them for at least 30 minutes; they are better after a few hours in the fridge. The vegetables need to stay below the surface of the liquid so they pickle evenly.

If the pickles are too sharp, add water and sugar a little at a time. If they have gone soft, it is usually because the strips were too fine or they were salted and squeezed too hard. Use a clean jar, take the vegetables out with clean utensils and keep them cold. Do not use pickling liquid that has turned cloudy, smells odd or is unusually bubbly.

Cooking broken rice so it is loose and tender

Rinse the rice gently two or three times until the water is less cloudy; do not rub it hard, which breaks the grains further. Soak it for 15-20 minutes and drain. Start with roughly 1 part rice to 1-1.1 parts water by volume, then adjust for your brand of rice and your cooker. Broken rice absorbs water faster than whole grains, so too much water easily makes it mushy.

When the rice is done, leave it on the keep-warm setting for 10 minutes, then turn it over from the bottom with a flat paddle. Lay a clean cloth under the lid for a few minutes if there is a lot of steam. Do not keep opening the lid while it cooks. If the rice is a little dry, sprinkle over some hot water and cover it for 5 minutes; if it is wet, fluff it out and keep it warm briefly without sealing the lid completely.

Step 1: heat the grill and scrape off the marinade solids

Take the chops out of the fridge while the grill heats, for no more than about 15 minutes. Scrape off the larger pieces of lemongrass and garlic so they do not char to carbon. On a charcoal grill, wait until the coals glow under a thin layer of ash and divide the fire into hotter and cooler zones. On a cast-iron pan or an electric hob, heat it to medium and brush on a very thin film of oil.

Do not grill directly over a flare-up. Dripping fat can set the flames going; move the meat to a cooler zone and cover it briefly rather than letting the flames lick it. Have a separate plate ready for the cooked meat, and never put it back on a tray that has held raw meat.

Step 2: grill the chops evenly

Put the chops over a medium zone and grill the first side for 4-6 minutes until it releases from the grate on its own, then turn. Grill the other side for 4-5 minutes, then move a thick chop to a cooler zone. Brush on a very thin layer of clean glaze at the end, rather than a thick coat of honey from the start. Turning too often makes it hard to build grill marks, but leaving it too long burns the sugar.

A whole cut of pork is safe when the thickest part reaches 63C and it rests for at least 3 minutes. Measure away from the bone. If you are serving people at higher risk and want it cooked further, you can take it to around 68-70C, but lower the heat so the meat does not dry out. The colour inside is not the only indicator; a thermometer gives more consistent results.

Step 3: rest the chops and make the spring onion oil

Put the chops on a clean plate, cover them loosely with foil and rest them for 5-7 minutes so the juices redistribute. Meanwhile, slice the spring onion and mix it with a little salt. Heat the oil until it is moderately hot and pour it over the onion, stirring; the onion should be green and slightly softened, not browned. You can add a few crisp pork scratchings, but only a small amount so the plate is not too rich.

Do not cut the chop the moment it comes off the grill, as the juices will run out. If you need to divide it for a child, cut it after the rest, across the grain. The clean juices on the resting plate can be poured back over, but never use any liquid from the raw meat tray.

Mixing the sweet-and-sour fish sauce

Dissolve the sugar in warm water, add the fish sauce and then the lime juice or vinegar, little by little. The ratio is only a starting point, because saltiness varies from brand to brand. Only once the taste is balanced should you add the chopped garlic and chilli; for the garlic to float attractively, the ingredients and bowl must be clean, the garlic chopped dry and the liquid not too hot.

The fish sauce for com tam is usually gently sweet, thin enough to soak into the rice but not bland. If it is too salty, add water and sugar in small proportions; if it is too sweet, add fish sauce and then acid. Do not pour in a lot of lime juice at once, as it is very hard to get back to the balance point.

Plating com tam

Press the rice lightly into a bowl and turn it out onto the plate; do not compact it. Put the chop beside the rice, add the egg, shredded pork skin or steamed pork loaf if you are using them, then the cucumber, tomato and pickles. Spoon the spring onion oil over the rice and the chop, and serve the fish sauce separately so each person can adjust it. The hot food and the raw vegetables should only meet at the moment of serving.

If you are making many portions, keep the rice warm and the chops on a tray in a low oven for a short time; do not leave the chops under a heat lamp for long. Arrange the vegetables plate by plate at the last minute so they do not wilt. Eggs are best fried in small batches close to serving.

Ten small tips

1. Use chops of fairly even thickness.
2. Score the fat rim so the chop does not curl.
3. Marinate in the fridge and turn the meat once.
4. Scrape off the larger pieces of lemongrass and garlic before grilling.
5. Divide the fire into a hotter and a cooler zone.
6. Only brush on the sweet glaze at the end.
7. Use a separate plate for cooked meat.
8. Measure the temperature in the thick part, away from the bone.
9. Rest the chops before cutting them.
10. Add the spring onion oil and fish sauce just before eating.

Common mistakes and how to rescue them

The chop is burnt outside and raw inside

The sugar burnt before the heat reached the middle. Move the chop to a cooler zone, cover it or put it in a 160C oven until it comes up to temperature. Next time use less honey, scrape off the marinade solids and keep the meat off a flare-up.

The chop is dry

It was too thin or went well past temperature. Rest it, slice it thinly across the grain and spoon over a little fish sauce and spring onion oil. The moisture cannot be fully restored; a thermometer and a proper rest are the most effective prevention.

The rice is wet or clumped

There was too much water, or the rice had not drained. Fluff it out on a wide tray for a few minutes, then keep it warm. Next time reduce the water by 5-10% and weigh the same brand of rice so the ratio stays consistent.

The dipping sauce is cloudy

The liquid was too hot when the lime and garlic went in, or the ingredients were still wet. The taste is not necessarily worse, but it looks poor. Next time let the mixture cool, use dry chopped garlic and add the acid last.

Other ways to cook the chops

In an oven, cook at 210C on a rack over a drip tray, turn after about 8 minutes and then check the temperature. In an air fryer, lay them in a single layer, start at 190C and check early, because the moving air darkens the sugar quickly. In a pan, use cast iron over a medium heat, sear both sides and cover briefly so the middle cooks. The timing always depends on the thickness.

Storage and preparing ahead

The pickles and the dipping sauce can be made in advance and kept cold in clean containers. The rice is best cooked close to the meal. Marinated raw chops stay in the fridge and are grilled within a safe period; do not leave them out in the kitchen for long. Leftover cooked chops go into a container within 2 hours, are used within 3-4 days and reheated to 74C.

Allergy notes

Fish sauce contains fish; soy sauce may contain soy and wheat; the egg, shredded pork skin and pork loaf are optional but need to be declared clearly when serving. Anyone limiting sodium should reduce the fish sauce in both the marinade and the dipping sauce. Utensils used for raw meat must be kept apart from vegetables that are eaten as they are.