Ode to Citizen Thai's Imperial Roll

I had a craving.

A craving for a specific item on the menu of a now defunct restaurant in a city I haven't lived in for over two years.

A craving for a certain crunchy, salty, spicy, sweet mouthful of yumminess. A craving for an Imperial Roll. From Citizen Thai and the Monkey, a Thai restaurant we used to frequent when we lived in North Beach (I even hosted my bridal tea there!) The Imperial Roll was on their appetizer menu and T. and I would order it without fail every time we treated ourselves to a night of Thai Food. We'd walk there from our little third-floor apartment and enjoy one of these straight away. Filled with ground pork, shrimp and peanuts and served up with a spicy, sour sauce, these crunchy treats were worth the uphill jaunt.

Now, several years, two children and two cities later, I had a hankering. So I decided to try and recreate this favorite.

And it was so good, so successful, you can try it too!

Ode to Citizen Thai's Imperial Roll
serves 4 adults for dinner

• 1 pound ground pork
• 1 shallot, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, diced
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon rice wine vinegar
• Fresh Thai Basil Leaves - about 15-2o of them, jullienned
• 1/2 cup roasted, salted almonds, roughly chopped (the original recipe called for peanuts, but I had almonds in the cupboard so used them instead this time.)
  
• 1 Tablespoon fish sauce
• 1 Tablespoon soy sauce
• 1/2 pound shrimp, cooked and diced into large-ish pieces
• 2 carrots(or about 6-8 baby carrots) peeled and sliced into matchstick pieces
• 1/2 cucumber, seeded and sliced into matchstick pieces
• 1/2 head of butter lettuce (or other lettuce of your choice), washed and julienned into shreds
  
• 3 green onions, chopped very thinly (I used chives for this because I had them fresh from my herb garden) - roughly 1/4 cup
• egg roll wrappers - about a dozen
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil (I used coconut) for frying

For the Spicy, Sour Dipping Sauce

Combine the following in a bowl

• 1 Thai chili or jalapeno, sliced into small rings
• 1 clove of garlic, diced very small
• 1/4 cup fish sauce
• 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
• 2 Tablespoons rice vinegar
• A squeeze of honey

For Salty, Roasted Spicy Dipping Sauce

Combine the following in a bowl

• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1 Tablespoon rice vinegar
• 1 Tablespoon toasted sesame oil
• 1-2 Tablespoons red chili paste

In a skillet over medium heat brown ground pork with shallots and garlic. Allow to cool. Add black pepper, sugar, rice wine vinegar, soy sauce and fish sauce. Add diced onions or chives and basil. Stir to combine and check for seasoning. You might need to add a teensy bit extra of soy sauce or rice wine vinegar.

This can be made in advance a few hours if you want to prep everything before assembly for dinner. Just keep everything in the fridge.

When ready to assemble and cook, heat the oil in a heavy bottomed skillet (I used my cast iron) to frying level, being careful not to make it too hot so it smokes.

With each eggroll wrapper, place a small amount of shrimp diagonally across the eggroll wrapper. Follow up with pork mixture, almonds, lettuce and vegetables of your choice.

Roll the eggroll.

I've tried several methods but found that it works best to roll the eggroll by wetting around the entire inner edge of the wrapper with your finger and a bit of water, fold in the two sides first, followed by the lower edge and finally roll up the eggroll until it meets the top edge, pressing to seal.

Continue until you completely use all of your protein ingredients. I made 9 hefty, entree-sized eggrolls (really, more like a chalupa than an eggroll! :) Making these will only take a few minutes with all of your ingredients prepped.

When the oil is hot, gently lower two or three eggrolls into the pan to brown, making sure not to crowd the pan. Once one side is browned, about two minutes, carefully flip with a spatula to brown the other side, about one to two minutes further. Once cooked, remove to a paper-towel lined tray or plate.

Complete cooking all of the eggrolls and serve with dipping sauces (which are made by just combining all of the ingredients in each recipe in a bowl. Very simple.)

These were FANTASTIC. So similar to our old favorite appetizer, but made entree style (probably in part because this was my first time making eggrolls. I'm a much more accomplished burrito constructor, and it shows . . . ) My favorite dipping sauce was the one with the jalapenos and lemon juice, it is more similar to the one that I loved that came at the restaurant, but my husband really loved the chili paste one. My son, Lloyd, helped me make these and had a blast and ate a good portion of one for dinner!

I am so glad that I went the extra mile and stepped into a cuisine I wasn't necessarily comfortable cooking . . . I successfully made a new favorite and one that will quickly become part of our repertoire!

For the busy mama's who are thinking I'm crazy to consider making Thai food one week after moving and with a toddler and two month old. You're partially right, But believe me when I tell you this is an easy, quick recipe. I cooked the pork in advance during nap time and prepped the veggies at that time as well (which only took about ten minutes). I stored it in the fridge until dinner time. I also used pre-cooked frozen shrimp and simply defrosted them in a bowl of cold water, de-tailed them and chopped them up. Once we were ready for dinner, building and cooking the eggrolls only took about twenty minutes, and I was able to wash most of the prep dishes before we sat down for dinner!

It can be done!

This would also be a great recipe for lettuce wraps (I recommend butter lettuce for this as it is crisp, yet soft enough to fold over the ingredients) but I would miss the crispy crunchiness of the eggroll wrapper. Either way, the flavors are phenomenal!

Enjoy!

This post is written in conjunction with Real Food Wednesday, Fight Back Friday and Works for Me Wednesday. Go, check out the other contributors!