Bun Rieu

A familiar starting point

For readers who mainly know Vietnamese food through pho, bun rieu is a useful next step: the same rice vermicelli base and bowl-and-broth format, but built around crab and tomato instead of a long-simmered bone broth. It’s a good illustration of how much variety sits behind the single word “noodle soup” in Vietnamese cooking.

History

Bun rieu is a rice vermicelli soup in a tangy tomato broth, topped with a crab-and-egg cake poached directly in the broth, a dish traditionally associated with the cuisine of northern Vietnam before spreading across the whole country.

Unlike pho, whose bone broth simmers for hours, bun rieu draws most of its flavor from tangy stewed tomatoes and sometimes a touch of fermented shrimp paste (mam tom), giving it a brighter, more acidic character.

Ingredients — serves 4

• Rice vermicelli (bun)
• 10.5 oz (300g) crab meat (or canned lump crab)
• 3 eggs
• 4 ripe tomatoes
• Fermented shrimp paste (mam tom, optional)
• Fresh herbs, scallions, lime

Bun Rieu, step by step

1. Blend the crab meat coarsely with the beaten eggs into a smooth mixture.
2. Sauté the tomato wedges in a little annatto oil to color the broth.
3. Bring a light broth to a boil, then gently pour in the crab-egg mixture in small cakes that poach and float to the surface.
4. Add the softened tomatoes and season with fermented shrimp paste and a little salt.
5. Cook the rice vermicelli separately in boiling water, then portion it into bowls.
6. Ladle the hot broth with the crab cakes over the noodles and garnish with fresh herbs, scallions, and a squeeze of lime before serving.

Cooking method

Technique: gently poaching a crab-and-egg mixture directly in a simmering tomato broth, where it forms tender cakes that float to the surface.

Traditional equipment: a large pot for the broth and a skimmer to carefully lift out the poached cakes.

Signs it’s ready: the broth should stay lightly tangy without turning sharp; the crab-and-egg cakes should stay soft, poached rather than overcooked.

Variations across Vietnam

Bun rieu changes considerably by region and household: some versions add cubes of fried tofu or pork, others include cubes of coagulated pig’s blood, and the tomato broth itself ranges from lightly tangy to distinctly sour depending on how much tamarind or extra lime goes in. The crab-and-egg cake described here is the one constant across almost every version.

Nutrition, per serving

Calculated from the raw ingredient quantities above, divided by four servings.

This is a carbohydrate-led bowl rather than a protein-led one. Most of the energy comes from the rice vermicelli, with crab and egg providing a comparatively modest 22 g of protein per serving. At 9 g of fat, of which only 2 g saturated, it’s a notably lean composition next to the meat-heavy dishes elsewhere in this collection — the richness here comes from the tomato broth’s acidity rather than from added fat.

Economic context

Bun rieu is typically street-food or home-lunch fare rather than a special-occasion dish, built from crab, tomatoes, and rice vermicelli — a shorter and less costly ingredient list than pho’s hours-long bone broth. It sits comfortably within everyday Vietnamese eating rather than above it.

Source: World Bank / FAO, Food Prices for Nutrition database (Cost and Affordability of a Healthy Diet) v4.0, 2024 data, CC BY 4.0, DOI 10.57966/41AN-KY81. Retrieved 29 July 2026. This figure describes the cost of a healthy diet in Vietnam generally — it is not a costing of this specific recipe.

Who this dish suits

What about you?

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