Our Cambodian num pang recipe makes what I called num pang barang – ‘barang’ means ‘foreigner’ in Khmer. ‘Num pang’ in Khmer like ‘banh mi’ in Vietnamese is ‘bread’ but typically refers to the ubiquitous French-style demi-baguette and a filled baguette at that. A typical Cambodian num pang is similar to Vietnamese banh mi – packed with porky goodness, pâté and salad. Our num pang barang makes use of holiday turkey leftovers but you could fill it with any leftover roast or rotisserie chicken.
This Cambodian num pang recipe makes my ‘num pang barang‘, num pang filled with turkey, and specifically leftover holiday turkey. ‘Num pang’ like ‘banh mi’ means ‘bread’, but typically a traditional Cambodian filled demi-baguette, which here in Siem Reap is usually packed with pork, cold cuts, and/or pâté, carrot and daikon quick pickle, other salad ingredients, such as crispy slices of cucumber, even tomato, and fresh herbs such as coriander, and chilli sauce.
Having said that, there are an infinite number of versions of num pang, with each mobile seller putting her own stamp on her num pang. Another popular num pang in Siem Reap is stuffed with fried meatballs, another with tinned mackerel, canned Spam sandwich meat is also popular, and roast chicken, which Cambodians do so well, is another favourite.
In Battambang‘s markets, I’ve seen num pang sellers load their baguettes with fermented pickles and wet sauces, which has to be eaten fast, as the bread gets soggy quickly. And in Phnom Penh, a num pang with spongy fish cakes I once had was wonderful, although I’ve never seen it since. In the capital, they tend to slather their num pang with mayonnaise, just as the legendary Vietnamese banh mi makers in Hoi An do, whereas in Siem Reap mayo is often scraped on thinly.
Of all the num pang varieties I’ve seen in Cambodia, I’ve never spotted any num pang with turkey, nor known of Cambodians even eating turkey, which is why I have called this Cambodian num pang recipe ‘num pang barang’ – ‘barang’ meaning ‘foreigner’ in Khmer, and this Cambodian num pang recipe includes our Christmas turkey leftovers.
Cambodian Num Pang Recipe Num Pang Barang with Christmas Turkey Leftovers
I’ve been meaning to post a Cambodian num pang recipe for a traditional Cambodian num pang for quite a while, but simply haven’t got around to it. I will do that soon, but in the meantime you now have my num pang barang creation, invented to use the remaining turkey leftovers from Neil Perry’s wonderful butterflied roast turkey with stuffing recipe that Terence made for Christmas.
As wonderful as Neil’s turkey recipe was, three nights of eating it was too much for us, so yesterday we made turkey and avocado club sandwiches with Sriracha mayonnaise. However, that still left us with quite a lot of turkey…
As we still had some Sriracha mayonnaise left and there were half a dozen tuk tuk drivers parked on the street below our Siem Reap apartment, we decided to use the turkey and Sriracha mayo to create some Cambodian num pang and feed the boys downstairs.
As Cambodians don’t eat turkey – they eat a great deal of pork, fish and seafood, and plenty of poultry, primarily chicken and duck – and I knew the guys would ask me what it was, and I had no idea what ‘turkey’ was in Khmer, I decided to call the turkey, salad and herb rolls ‘num pang barang’. The drivers enjoyed that joke. They also enjoyed our num pang barang!
Unfortunately, not all the usual tuk tuk drivers were still there by the time I took the basket of num pang down to them (of course, we had to do a quick photo shoot after making them…). So one good man, one of our regular drivers, who has a big heart, asked me if he could take some to “the poor hungry orphan children on the riverside”.
“OMG, of course!!!” I told him. I didn’t even know that homeless orphaned children slept on the riverside at night. I made a note to investigate that situation the next day and went upstairs and made more num pang barang.
For those of you who haven’t heard of Cambodia’s num pang, it’s very similar to the better-known Vietnamese banh mi – a Vietnamese sandwich or technically a demi baguette packed with char sui-style pork, pâté, and other porky bits, along with salad.
Just as the style of Vietnamese banh mi differs by region, city, town, village, and cook, so does the Cambodia num pung recipe – so you’ll see num pang Siem Reap, num pang Phnom Penh, and so on. And of course individual cooks get creative, innovating so that their num pang is distinguished from others.
Someone once asked me which I thought came first – the Cambodian num pang or Vietnamese banh mi. The reality is that they probably both came about around the same time. It was the French who brought the baguette to both Cambodia and Vietnam, which were part of French Indochina.
French Indochina was formed in 1887 from Cambodia and the three Vietnamese regions of Tonkin in the north, Annam in what we now know as Central Vietnam, and Cochinchina in the south. Laos was added until 1893. The capital of Indochina was initially Saigon then Hanoi and later Dalat before it was moved to Hanoi again.
However, it’s worth noting that while the French were baking and eating bread when they arrived in the region, the term ‘baguette’ (meaning a stick, baton or wand) – which refers to a long skinny loaf – didn’t come into usage until 1920.
Tips to Making my Cambodian Num Pang Recipe Num Pang Barang to Use up Turkey Leftovers
Aside from the use of turkey, the addition of Sriracha mayonnaise also makes this Cambodian num pang recipe ‘foreign’. Cambodians do slather mayonnaise onto their num pang. They’ll also squirt on some Sriracha sauce, which is from Sriracha on the coast of neighbouring Thailand, which was once part of Cambodia.
But Cambodians do eat cornichons, small French-style gherkins, and other pickles. But we’ve never seen a sauce of mayonnaise, Sriracha and cornichons, which we like to make.
Cambodians and Vietnamese both use baguettes in their cuisines, not only for their num pang and banh mi, but also to mop up stews and curries, and they will often put meatballs and barbecued skewers in a buttered baguette, which is a popular street food snack.
You’ll find links within the recipe to recipes for the Sriracha mayonnaise (which we make with homemade sriracha) and the pickled daikon and carrot that goes in the Cambodian num pang and the Vietnamese banh mi. Both are easy to make. And of course if you don’t have turkey you can use leftover roast chicken, roast pork, or roast beef.
We also have more num pang, banhi mi and other sandwich recipes from around the world and recipes for our favourite homemade condiments and easy pickles.
Cambodian Num Pang Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 demi-baguette
- Sriracha mayonnaise - see this Sriracha mayonnaise recipe
- 4-5 pieces of turkey - we used Christmas turkey leftovers from this recipe; chicken is also an option
- 1 cucumber - skin on, sliced thin
- dozen small sprigs of coriander
- dozen basil leaves
- dozen mint leaves
- handful of pickled carrots and daikon - see this pickled carrots and daikon recipe
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180°C (355°F).
- Place the demi-baguettes in the oven until warm – usually about a minute.
- Slice the baguette lengthways but don’t cut all the way through.
- Spread the Sriracha mayonnaise thickly on both the bottom half and top half of the baguette.
- Add coriander next, then the cucumber slices, basil after that, then the slices of turkey, and mint.
- Add the pickled carrots and daikon and any leftover herbs to pretty it up.
- Add a few more drops of Sriracha if you like things spicy.
- Eat immediately!
Nutrition
Do let us know if you make our Cambodian num pang recipe for num pang barang as we’d love to know what you think.
When you were in Cambodia did you see them put a thick sweet sauce on the baguettes? similar to honey… but different? I have had no luck finding out what that was…
Hi Shannon, we live in Cambodia :) Normally they will spread either a rustic pate on the baguette, or a chilli sauce… but neither are really like honey. The closest thing to honey here is a caramel-like palm sugar syrup. But they don’t usually put that on num pang. Do you have a pic or any more info? Happy to investigate for you :)
“Caramel-like palm sugar syrup” sounds like a good name for what I had. It was a baguette cut in half with this thick glaze inside that was toasted, and on the side were some thin duck slices and some slightly vinegar-y sliced vegetables. It was very tasty, but I didn’t know what it was. The shop is just outside the Phnom Pehn airport.
Didn’t even know this was a ‘thing’. Banh Mi joints are everywhere in Sydney and Melbourne now and are doing some not-so-traditional fillings, mainly to cater for vegetarians. Made your version with chicken, we find turkey too dry. It was delicious!
Kimberley, we dream of the day when num pang is a ‘thing’ in Australia. We agree re the turkey. That was Neil Perry’s fault we made turkey that Christmas. We were hoping he was going to suggest something Asian or a Mexican feast, which is what we noticed on his Instagram page he ended up doing! Thanks for dropping by!
This is such an interesting article with such a delicious recipe shared for all. Even with such simple and few ingredients, it’s such a scrumptious dish. As an Indian restaurant ourselves, at Shiva Shakti, we serve traditional Indian-Mughlai food in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Check out our website for more information about us.
Hello, thanks for the kind words. I will definitely check out your website and we’ll dine there when we’re in Phnom Penh again in a few weeks. I’ve had to remove your link, however, as we have a policy of not publishing promotional comments/links as it encourages spammers. I’ve left this comment here as I know how challenging it’s been for restaurants throughout the pandemic and our readers can Google your restaurant if it interests them.