San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
VIETNAMESE COMFORT FOOD WITH A POP CULTURE TWIST.
Nerdy chefs offer comfort food at its caramelbraised best
I first thought the aesthetic of Vietnamese popup Claws of Mantis — a project from four cooks who have done time at notable San Francisco restaurants Nari, Mister Jiu’s, Aziza and Saison — was purely ironic. The website is modeled after the ancient Windows 95 interface, down to the flying toasters screen saver, which I used to stare at every day while waiting hours for an MP3 to download. The cooks’ bio photos are framed inside of YuGiOh cards from a game that peaked in popularity in 2004, when the cooks were likely in middle school and actually playing it with school friends at recess.
But as I sipped on a simple, barely seasoned pork meatball broth during my third ( and final) time ordering from them, the sentimental thesis behind Claws of Mantis, and its sense of introspection, became clear. If Claws of Mantis were a website, it would be Xanga, the 2000sera blogging platform popular with Asian Americans: The popup is a loving tribute to Vietnamese home cooking and corny Asian American pop culture that embraces both with unadorned sincerity.
Like other cooks have done this year, Kevin Tang, Kris Hoang, Shane Sardina and Dan Kanzler started Claws of Mantis as a side hustle to make rent money during the pandemic. Each iteration of the popup, available for online preorders only, presents a completely new menu, commonly sold as a $ 65$ 70 set of five courses for two people. Everything is delivered at room temperature, with colorcoded components and stickers indicating which scallions or fried shallots go on which dishes. Microwave directions are included; while they were useless to me, a person who only recently bought herself a microwave, reheating soups and stirfried vegetables is a simple matter on a stovetop.
Considering their backgrounds, it’s reasonable to expect that their take on Southern Vietnamese comfort food would have a very newwave feel to it, with touches of technical finesse applied to the classics. The skill of the food, though, is less “elevation” the way that fine dining chefs commonly espouse it and more of an homage to food that secondgeneration immigrants like Hoang and Tang once rejected.
In late August, the popup served a menu that ended with che bap, a dessert soup that’s a common sight at banh mi shops, and a dish that’s also a sneaky way for parents to get their kids to eat their vegetables. The cooks seize peakofseason sweet corn in a thick rock sugar syrup, letting the kernels float visibly under the surface like pebbles in a cold, rippling creek. Tapioca pearls add to the dish’s chewiness, while toasted sesame seeds suggest an uncanny baked aroma. Pandan leaves and corn cobs steeped in the syrup intensify the corn flavor and thicken the mixture. It was an unforgettable embrace of the heat and sweetness of summer.
Another dish on that menu was thit kho, with jiggly, squareish hunks of pork belly braised with aromatics in a fish sauce caramel and coconut water. It was presented simply, brown meat with a brown egg in brown braising liquid, with the luxuriously slowcooked meat and strong, Maillardenhanced sauce left alone to speak for themselves. The pork’s fat layers had a cottony, soft give to them and had fully absorbed the caramel’s flavors.
The menu’s constant changes feel a little bittersweet, especially when something’s really, really phenomenal, like the che bap. I hate knowing that I’ll never eat these exact dishes again ( or at least for a very long while). But that feeling is apt for a project that is so centered on nostalgia.
On an Instagram post about the thit kho, Tang wrote that it was a simple, cheap and nourishing dish his and Hoang’s moms made several times a month, much to their children’s dismay. But as adults, they began to miss it. The dish’s simplicity is sentimental to the core: Besides small tweaks like using better meat or seasoning it just right, no one can improve on what Mom did.
That’s not to say the guys behind CoM don’t make any loud, punchy dishes. At an event in late October, when CoM collaborated with Gamsaan Cocktail Co., the popup offered its first a la carte menu, which included a $ 15 green mango salad with shrimp. Lippuckering
shreds of unripe mango were tamed by a salty, chileand garlicforward nuoc cham dressing and a liberal sprinkle of pungent, heady herbs like rau ram and Thai basil. Airy tapioca and shrimp chips, fried until puffy, could be used to scoop little mouthfuls of salad. If you’ve ever had papaya salad, this would be familiar, though green mango is much more sour than papaya. The dishes during this round were more assertive in flavor, pairing well with mixologist Danny Louie’s potent baijiu cocktails.
Notably, the partnership was announced with a remixed clip of Dragon Ball Z, the 1990sera fighting anime best known for its hypermasculine, muscleobsessed character design. To someone outside of this demographic, much of the popup might be confusing. Though Dragon Ball Z had a broad appeal beyond Asian America, it’s one aesthetic touch of many from Claws that is based on popular Asian American cultural touchstones: social media posts feature Tamagotchis and cheesy musical variety shows, and Dragon Ball party decorations spruce up the otherwise utilitarian look of the plastic takeout containers. Postcards printed with glamour shots of the flamboyant, Orange Countybased singer Tuan Anh, dressed like a Dolly Parton stunt double, make frequent appearances in the packages.
People of a certain age normally wouldn’t want to be associated with the somewhat humiliating ephemera of 1990s Asian Americana. On a cultural level, people distanced themselves, even to the extent of preemptively making fun of traditional dishes and public figures like Anh, lest they be ridiculed for being nerdy or freshofftheboat or, in certain cases, unmanly. You’re cool now ... right? But Claws of Mantis centers it, celebrates it, just as it embraces the Vietnamese soul food that Tang and Hoang used to roll their eyes at.
That pork meatball soup, served on their first December menu, was strikingly similar to one I used to have while visiting my cousins in rural Illinois, where my late aunt cooked meals that were more traditional and frugal. Her soups were clear pork and chicken broths, seasoned simply with white pepper and fish sauce. I’m sorry to say that when we could, my cousins and I would escape the comfortable aromas of home to eat anything different, which in their town meant Taco Bell, Steak ‘ n’ Shake or Papa John’s. Home food was something you choked down while dreaming about burritos.
Claws of Mantis’ version of the soup was a clear broth with chunks of al dente kabocha squash, grilled scallions and pork meatballs. Strips of black fungus trailed out of the meatballs, giving them a cartilaginous crunch. The mild, porky taste was a flavor that I dreaded as a child. Now, it tasted heartfelt in its straightforwardness, its commitment to care and feeding. It made me remember my aunt when I least expected to, and all the work she did to feed my cousins and me.
And like the thit kho, presenting all of these previously embarrassing or annoying things, sincere in their nakedness, seems like the Claws team’s way of kicking shame to the curb.