Vietnamese Fish Sauce Dipping Sauce (Nuoc Cham)
A quick and easy recipe for Vietnamese Dipping Sauce (Nuoc Cham / Nuoc Mam) made with fish sauce with a balance of sweet, sour and salty flavors.
Servings: 1 cup
Calories: 151kcal
Ingredients
- 1 clove garlic
- 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice (approximately 1 lime, or substitute with white vinegar)
- 2 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon sugar
- 6 tablespoons hot water
- 2 tablespoons fish sauce
- carrots (optional, for color)
- 1 fresh birds eye chili pepper (optional, for a bit of spiciness)
Instructions
- Peel the garlic and finely chop it. Add it to a small bowl (or jar if you are making a bigger batch)
- Cut the lime in half and squeeze all the lime juice into the bowl (or jar) with the garlic and let it sit for about 10-15 minutes. The acid from the lime juice will cut the sharp garlic spicy bite.
- Once 10-15 minutes is up, add the sugar into the garlic/lime juice mix and pour in the hot water. Stir everything together until the sugar dissolves completely.
- Once the sugar has dissolved, add in the fish sauce and mix.
- Voila! Nuoc cham is done! It can be stored in the fridge or used right away! :)
Notes
- I like my nuoc cham a bit on the sweeter side so that it has a sweet and sour flavor. If you prefer the sauce more sour/tangy, reduce the sugar by ½ tablespoon
- Most restaurants use vinegar instead of fresh lime juice. To get a nuoc mam closer to the restaurant-style ones, use vinegar instead of fresh lime juice. Keep in mind that fresh lime juice is slightly more tangy than vinegar and has a bit more flavor though.
- To reduce the raw bite from fresh garlic, soak the garlic in the lime juice for 10-15 minutes. The acid mellows out the garlic slightly so it has less of a spicy bite.
- This recipe can be doubled, tripled or quadrupled with no issues
- How long you can store this is highly dependent on whether you use vinegar in the sauce. If you are using only fresh lime juice, then I would not keep this for more than a week or two, but is best enjoyed fresh. If there is vinegar in it, you can keep it for about 2 months. Make sure you store it in an airtight jar in the fridge.
- If you are using lime juice for your recipe, use fresh lime juice and not the bottled stuff, there is a big difference in flavor between the two.
