Crab Summer Rolls

Vietnamese summer rolls, (also known as fresh spring rolls or summer rolls) are a healthy, often low-fat meal or snack I’m a huge fan of. Gourmet magazine’s description – “a salad packed into an edible container” –says it all.

Once you’ve gathered all your ingredients, done your prep work, and mastered the basics, you can play around with the recipe to your heart’s content. Mock crab summer rolls are one of my favorites, but truthfully, there is no bad version of these. The same can be said about the endless dipping sauce options. To keep these simple (and quick) I like to serve these with just a little low-sodium soy sauce with just a splash of white vinegar, but others prefer sweet, spicy hoisin, sweet and sour, or a classic peanut sauce and I support those options as well.

How To Stuff and Assemble Summer Rolls

Shellfish or Meat Filling

There are endless filling combinations. I use a readily available mock crab for this recipe *my son’r favorite), but shrimp, salmon, tofu, chicken, roasted pork, or straight vegetarian are all great options.

Vegetables

Lettuce of all varieties, cabbage, julienned carrots, cucumbers, avocados, scallions, daikon radish, you name it, anything with texture works in summer rolls.

Herbs

Herbs play a big part in Vietnamese cooking – they’re often used more like a salad leaf than a garnish, and in the summer roll it’s no exception. My go-to in this recipe is cilantro, but mint, Thai basil or a combination are great options.

Noodles

The gold standard is rice vermicelli noodles which I use and like to presoak in slightly salted water for about 4-5 minutes in hot water to soften. Other noodles can be used, rice stick noodles or other wider, flatter noodles but with these be careful to season them before rolling in your summer rolls.

Wrappers

Rice paper rounds can be commonly found in grocery stores (even Amazon carries them) and are used to make summer rolls but working with these takes a bit of practice. The wrapper must be soft enough to roll, but not so soft that it tears in the process. This takes a bit of practice. My method, dunking them in warm water and then rubbing them with wet hands until there are no longer any brittle patches. And lightly patting them dry afterwards with paper towel.

Extra Add-Ins

Sometimes you will see roasted peanuts, chilies, lemongrass are common go-to add-ins, go ahead get creative.

Rolling

This is the trickiest aspect of summer rolls, but practice helps. It’s important to remember you will need less filling per summer roll than you think you’ll need. Otherwise, it’s hard to seal the rolls. I find it easiest to start with the lettuce and noodles then go from there. Fold the sides in first and then roll the paper up tightly around the filling.

Crab summer rolls (or any other variety) are a great meal option in summer and a fun project for kids. People ask me all the time how to get kids to heat more vegetables, as Master Chef Jacques Pépin says, “involve them in the process“. I agree 100%. Kids are often willing to try (and like) things they have made themselves. Take advantage of that and who knows, maybe you’ll even get a day off from cooking.