Banh Cuon Kim Thanh is a Vietnamese restaurant tucked away down the end of one of many little shopping arcades in Bankstown. Here you'll find a range of delicious banh cuon or rice flour roll cakes, offal porridge and crispy banh khot prawn cakes. All washed down with a strong Vietnamese iced coffee or tea! Get the lowdown on what to order here.
Banh Cuon Kim Thanh is the kind of place where you need to be in the know where to go. Located down the very end of a small arcade in Bankstown, there's no signage from the main street.
"I think it's down here," I say to Sophia. Having just come back from Vietnam, I'm still craving some of the food that we had. This always happens to me after a trip where I've really enjoyed the food and usually lasts for a few weeks.
Banh Cuon Kim Thanh is named after Kim Thanh, Anthony Dinh's mother who passed on the recipes for this restaurant to him. Anthony explains that 9 years ago the restaurant was featured on TV and introduced viewers to Banh Cuon or rice rolls and the kitchen was the site for demos and cooking classes. Nowadays he spends most of his time as a landscape photographer travelling around the world and this is his other business.
We start with drinks and Sophia has an iced tea while I order the Vietnamese iced coffee with milk that is so strong that I have to take a minute before my second sip. They're not messing about with the coffee.
The menu at Banh Cuon Kim Thanh is short and sweet and we know what we want. It starts with the Banh Cuon or steamed rice flour rolls. There are a few versions but this has a bit of everything with fried pork, a meat rice roll, Chả lụa or Vietnamese ham and silky steamed rice rolls. There's fresh mint on the side, shredded lettuce and bean sprouts too as well as a dipping sauce. It's a choose your own adventure, you can dip the pork in the sauce or wrap up the ham in the rice roll with mint and then dip it or eat the meat roll dipped in the sauce or any combination thereof.
We also try the version with egg and pork all rolled up like a pancake and cut into bite sized pieces. There's a vegan version of this as well and it's a tasty version of the rice rolls with lots of flavour. There's also chilli next to the urn of hot tea and tissues that you can add to your nuoc mam sauce.
Then comes the congee. There is only one type of congee and this one is replete with all kinds of pork offal plus chunks of lemongrass scented pork sausage and you tiou or long Chinese donuts. The congee is warming and delicious and the offal is tasty and mild flavoured. There's liver, kidney and intestines. The pork flavours the rice beautifully and pork congee is one of my favourite types of congee (although I don't make mine with offal at home) but the offal is cleaned well so there is no strong offal aroma.
Sophia has never tried banh khot before but I had an inkling that she'd love these crispy little savoury pancake bites. There are three versions: shrimp, meat and vegan in a rice flour batter. They're wonderfully crispy and the prawn at the centre is perfectly cooked and not overcooked given how crispy the bottoms are. I wrap one in a soft lettuce leaf with mint and dip it into the nuon mam. Heaven.
There's no dessert but in a suburb like Bankstown there's no shortage of options, even just outside the arcade!
So tell me Dear Reader, do you crave the food from a holiday after you've come back? How long does that last?
This meal was independently paid for.
Banh Cuon Kim Thanh
Shop 7/313 Chapel Rd, Bankstown NSW 2200
Phone: (02) 9708 6661
Sunday to Thursday 9 am–6 pm
Friday & Saturday 9 am–7 pm
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