When I was first learning to make these many years ago, I purchased the ingredients at a small Asian market. The proprietor was an older Vietnamese man and he told me the secret to making them was to use very hot water to soften the sheets. Many recipes say to use cool or just warm water. I find the hot water seems to bring out the starch and I never have problems with them sticking together. With hot water, you have to work quickly to get them in and out of the water before they turn to slime, but I soften them, then blot on linen or flour sack kitchen towels to remove excess water. They will stick just fine.

Lars,

I make summer rolls fairly often, they're great as pre-dinner finger food. I don't have a problem getting the rice paper to stick, I have just the opposite problem. It sticks to itself and to the rolls next to them readily.

Are you soaking the rice paper for long enough? When you take them out of the water, they should be very pliable. If you leave them too long, they fall apart. So there's a fine line between being just right and too soft. For me, I use tepid water and a soak of about 30-45 seconds is enough. When I take them out of the water, they are wet and continue to soften as I roll them.

Same is true of the rice noodles. In my area (N. Mexico) I have found a variety of rice noodles, ranging from some which are dense and need about a 15 minute boil before they are cooked and can be shaped, to the Vietnamese kind which I'm more used to. These noodles can be cooked in boiling water and within about a minute or two, they are softened and can be used in the rolls. Too long, and they fall into shreds.

I fill mine with whatever is fresh and good. I often add Vietnamese pickled radish or carrot (I make these a quart at a time and use in banh mi). You can keep the rolls vegetarian with lightly cooked vegetables, or salad greens with some avocado.

For dipping sauces, my favorite is nuoc cham. If you're interested I'll post the recipe. It's lime juice, chili, fish sauce and a little water. I find it adds zest to the rolls without adding too much of a different taste.

Cheryl

Thanks for the help! I started out using somewhat warm water, and the first two came out perfect and stuck just the right amount. Then the water I was using got cold, and I think that is what caused the problem. The recipe I have said to soak the paper in tepid water for 15 seconds, and perhaps that was not long enough, and afterwards, the water was not warm enough. I've made these before and found the rice paper to be sticky enough by itself, but I must have been using freshly warmed water each time. I also really need a better dish for soaking the paper. I was using a large dinner plate, but it was barely big enough and did cool off too quickly. I had the windows open in the kitchen, and the cool seabreeze probably cooled the water off too quickly.

I have several recipies for nuoc cham and make that often - I use that more frequently for the fried rolls. The fresh rolls I made were fairly bland (except for the mint leaves), possibly because I used cooked frozen shrimp that I defrosted in warm water. Next time I'll cook the shrimp myself. I would like to see your version of nuoc cham as well!

Lars

I love unfried summer rolls, we are having them for dinner tonight. I like to use fresh basil in them as there's always an abundance and I'm not fond of mint.

I admit, mine look about like yours. From photos, it appears mine (and yours) are overstuffed.
I've made a thousand summer rolls and some stick better than others. No clue!

So timely! This morning I bought ingredients for summer rolls including square rice paper to see how these wrap versus round.

What dip are you using?

Calling Jessy, she is the one who taught us to make these at Canny Camp.

Lars,

The recipe I like for nuoc cham is from The Classic Cuisine of Vietnam by Bach Ngo and Gloria Zimmerman.

Ingredients:
1 clove garlic
1/2 fresh hot chili pepper or 2 dried
2 heaping tsp granulated sugar
1/8 fresh lime
2 tablespoons fish sauce
2/5 tablespoons water, more if necessary

Peel garlic. Split chili pepper and remove seeds and membrane. Mash chili with garlic and sugar*. Squeeze lime juice and add to mash, together with lime pulp. Add fish sauce and water to taste.

*the recipe calls for this to be done with a mortar and pestle. I use the food processor.

I'm adding David Chang's (of Momofuku fame) recipe for summer rolls (he calls them spring rolls, but I believe spring = cooked). You can find it online at New York Magazine (nymag.com), and there's also a youtube video. I use this as a starting point and make changes I like, e.g. I add rice noodles to the mix to soak up the juices. Otherwise it is pretty messy.

SHRIMP SPRING ROLLS

PICKLED VEGETABLES
1 cup rice-wine vinegar
1 cup sugar**
1 medium daikon radish, julienned
1 medium carrot, julienned
DIPPING SAUCE
1/4 cup fish sauce
2 tablespoons finely chopped cilantro stems
1/4 cup white sugar
2 bird's-eye chiles, minced

1/4 cup soy sauce
2 pounds shrimp, cleaned and de-veined
2 tablespoons grapeseed oil
1/4 cup soy sauce
4 scallions, white part only, finely chopped
Freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon sherry vinegar
1/2 cup cilantro, loosely packed, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup mint, loosely packed, coarsely chopped
1/4 cup basil, loosely packed, coarsely chopped
1 packet of Red Rose Vietnamese 22-cm. spring-roll skins (24 to a pack)
PICKLED VEGETABLES: Heat the rice-wine vinegar with 1 cup water in a saucepan; add the sugar, mixing until it dissolves. Set aside to cool. Place the daikon and carrot into separate small containers, cover with the pickling liquid, and set aside for several hours or overnight.
DIPPING SAUCE: Combine all ingredients in a bowl, add 1/4 cup water, and mix together well.
Chop the shrimp into 1/2-inch pieces or slice lengthwise with a knife; do not use a processor.
Heat the grapeseed oil in a saute pan over medium-high heat. Add the shrimp in batches, and cook for about 2 minutes, until the shrimp turns pink. Remove from the pan immediately (they will continue to cook). In a bowl, combine shrimp, soy sauce, scallions, black pepper, and 1 tablespoon sherry vinegar, mix well, and allow to marinate for 30 minutes. Add the herbs to the shrimp just before assembling the rolls.
Fill a large bowl with warm water, and soak one spring-roll skin until pliable. On a flat work surface, carefully spread the moistened skin flat. At one end, put 2 tablespoons of shrimp, then cover it with pickled daikon and carrots. Fold the sides in, and roll as tightly as possible. Repeat with the remaining skins, stack the rolls on a large platter, and serve with the dipping sauce at room temperature. (These can be made 2 hours ahead and refrigerated.)
** I use 1/2 cup which is how Andrea Nguyen makes it.

Cheryl

Thanks, Cheryl! That looks really good. I also cut back on the sugar a bit and only add it to my taste. I'm okay with these sauces being a bit sweet (most sweet sauces I do not like at all; I especially hate sweet BBQ sauce), and so I balance the ingredients the way I like them. Sometimes I add more vinegar or lime juice if it is too sweet.

Let's see if I can remember the dipping sauce that I made:

3/4 cup water
1/2 cup chopped red onion
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 tbsp samal oelek
1 Serrano chili, seeded and minced
1/4 cup black bean sauce
1/2 cup hoisin sauce (this was all the sweetness I wanted!)
juice of one lime
2 tbsp Vietnamese fish sauce (similar to Thai fish sauce)
3 tbsp dry roasted peanuts (could have used more)

I mixed all the ingredients except the peanuts in a sauce pan and simmered it for 10-20 minutes. I pureed the peanuts using a stick blender and added a bit of the sauce liquid to keep them from jumping around, and then I blended everything together. We used up half the sauce I made for six summer rolls, and so I have half of it left over for the next batch!

I have sweet basil, Thai basil, and cilantro in my back yard, and so I have all the ingredients to make your sauce, Cheryl.

On Friday, I made a Thai marinade for tuna that included fresh lemongrass, a bunch of Kaffir lime leaves, lime juice, fish sauce, ginger, garlic, black vinegar, and some Thai green curry paste. I have half of that marinade left over as well. It has a very distinctive Thai flavor - the curry paste added a bit of coriander flavor, which I prefer to keep in small quantities. I'm going to have to control myself from cutting leaves off the lime tree until it gets bigger!

Lars

Lars,

Your dipping sauce sounds delish! I try to keep hoisin to a small amount because it's such a dominant flavor.

I'd like to try your curry marinade as well. I'm always looking for ways to use my Kaffir lime which is huge, with very scary thorns. Any excuse to cut it back is good.

Thanks,
Cheryl

Hi Lars, looks like everyone beat me to the answer of soaking the skins in warm water. I love these rolls. When I lived in Taiwan, spring rolls were the large fried rolls. I loved those too. I took a platter of summer rolls to a party - my gosh that was risky - everyone ate them all up quickly, which is good because the skins are very perishable and were just about to break apart. I won't do it again unless it's at my house for just a few people.

Here, the Vietnamese call those spring rolls (rouleaux de printemps) and the fried ones are nems.

I soak the rice paper in warm water for a few seconds, and while they are still kinda stiff, but totally wet, I put them on the plate to get them ready to fill and then roll up.

Here's a peanut sauce recipe I enjoy. I forget the source, though. Sorry!

Sauce recipe:
1/3 C p-nut butter
3 T brown sugar
1/4 C. lemon juice
2 T. hot chili sauce
1/2 tsp soy sauce
shredded carrots
Top with chopped peanuts

Mix it all together.

I make versions of these all the time in warmer weather. I've never had a problem with the rice papers sealing. I use hot water to soak the rice papers and change the water before it cools. Works great!

Even my vegetable phobic husband will eat vegetables when they are in a summer roll. (I've always called them fresh spring rolls.)

Gina, I can't imagine traveling with these rolls, as they are a bit delicate and do not store well.

Nice picture, Sooz - you arranged your plate much more artfully than I did - I was just glad to get mine on the plate without falling apart. Mine really were not stuffed that much - they were just loose, except for the first two that I made. I do feel more confident now about making more. I think I will get better with more practice.

Kevin and I went to a Vietnamese restaurant on Maui where I ordered some sort of "burrito" dish. They brought me something like a Thai beef salad, some rice vermicelli, and a stack of dry rice paper and some warm water to soak them in. So I had to assemble my burritos myself, and I had no instructions for how to do it, but I managed very well. The very first Vietnamese restaurant that I went to was a French Vietnamese restaurant on La Brea in Hollywood, and I liked it a lot, partly because there was a definite French influence in some of the dishes. It's not there anymore, and I haven't found another like it.

Lars

The first ones I made, with the hottest water, stuck the best, but not great. I think I might need to pile the filling more in the center, mine are definitely longer than soozs and I may not have enough room on the ends to wrap tightly.

I am having a hardtime getting the filling wrapped tight also, the shrimp keep falling out.

One of the Thai restaurants in Seattle where I go makes their fresh spring rolls by extending the ends of the lettuce (beautiful ruffly leaves)out the ends of the rolls. The rolls have the filling enclosed by the wrapper rolled in the middle, but the sides aren't folded in (that's where the lettuce extends just a bit past the edge of the wrapper). Then they are cut in half and placed on the plate, cut side down, ruffled lettuce at the top. It is the most beautiful presentation and I now make mine that way, too.

Kind of like this:

When I make them, I submerge the paper in room temp. water for 20 seconds. It might be a little stiff yet, but it will continue to soften after you pull them out of the water. I use a spray bottle with water to spritz on them if they're not flexible enough by the time I'm ready to roll.

I roll mine on a tea towel.

I've found it easier to roll if I put lettuce on top of the fillings and roll the paper tightly around the lettuce. The lettuce helps to keep the other stuff in place.

They actually don't store too badly overnight. I lie lettuce in a container and put the rolls in a single layer over the lettuce, and then cover with more lettuce, and seal the container. The lettuce helps to keep them from drying out.

My favorite filling combo is mint, shrimp, julienned cucumbers and carrots, snow peas, rice noodles, and crunchy lettuce. And I make mine the same size as yours, but I only fold one end if I make them for myself. It's just faster. If I'm serving them for others, I'll fold both ends and cut in half.

I like that idea olychick - thanks for the pic. It would be tricky to get them to stand up though. I'd have to practice!

Hey Cathy thanks for the heads up. yup, warm water. I was also told to use freshly purchased rice paper; if they sit in your pantry for a while, it isn't good. I don't know why, though!

Now I am hungry for these, lol.

We fill spring rolls with stirfried rice noodles that have black ear fungus, fried tofu, bean curd sheets, mock duck, baby corn, and fermented bean curd as seasoning. Spring rolls like this are also fried.

Susytwo, that is a great idea about using lettuce to store/transport them. They always stick together and the wrapper can get so tough if it dries out.

When I'm making a lot of these in advance, I mist a light spray of cooking oil (safflower, corn) on the outside. If you keep it very light, the oil is tasteless and not noticeable in any way. I use plastic wrap around the outside as well. This keeps the rolls from drying out and also from sticking together. It isn't a perfect solution, only good for a couple of hours, but it helps.

Cheryl

Cheryl, thanks for that tip, too! This is opening up my fresh spring roll eyes!

Where should I look in the grocery store for rice paper wrappers? After reading this thread, I was all excited to make Summer Rolls. I even started pickling my carrots last night! But when I went to the grocery today, there were no rice paper wrappers...at least none that I could find and the store manager did not think they carried them. BOO! HISS!

I will continue my quest when I go to The Big City next week. But where should I look? Which section of the store?

bbstx - if you can find an Asian grocery store, that would be easiest. Some supermarkets have an Asian or Ethnic aisle which might have them.

Good luck,
Cheryl

Which big city are you going to? Most regular supermarkets do not carry rice paper because most people do not buy it, and so you will have to go to some sort of specialty store. I buy mine at a Japanese market because it is closer to me than the Chinese or Korean markets. There is an Indonesian market not far from the Japanese market, and so if the Japanese market happens to run out, I can go there. There is a Burmese market even closer to me, but it has very limited inventory and is more like a delicatessen and sells take-out and frozen foods mostly. I have to cross the Orange Curtain to get to the nearest Vietnamese market, which is in Little Saigon in the O.C., and so I very seldom go there. Unfortunately, I got freaked out when the Japanese market ran out of rice paper, and so I bought more than I could use when they had it back in stock, and some of it is now a bit old. It is still usable, but I think it requires a longer soaking period.

Lars

Lars it also develops a rancid taste...much like rice gone bad, although many brands no longer have much, if any rice flour in them but are tapioca based. I don't buy ahead because I've been burned before trying to use my stock. Same with the maifun noodles. They can get pretty icky.

Oly, they are not that old and have no rancid taste at all. I have had problems with noodles developing a rancid taste, however, but not the skins. My rice paper is not even rice paper but "spring rolls skin", Orchids Brand, made in Vietnam. It contains wheat flour and salt, but no rice flour! I never really checked before and only thought they were rice paper. Anyway, they have the right flavor, or at least the same flavor that I have had in Vietnamese restaurants. The vermicelli I used was definitely made from rice flour, however.

Tonight I made Chinese egg rolls using traditional Chinese egg roll skins. I find them much easier to work with, but I had to cook the filling before making the rolls, and I made too much filling. I guess I will have them again tomorrow. I have a "Cool Daddy" deep fryer, which makes frying the egg rolls very easy. This is the first time I've used it in a few months, however.

Lars

I have nothing to add here, except to say how beautiful all the summer rolls look! Thanks Lars, Sooz, and Oly for sharing the pics

Lars,

I've never heard of summer roll wraps made of wheat flour! I have Red Rose which is 100% rice. I bought a ton when a store near me was going out of business a while back, and I've used them as recently as a couple of months ago. There's no rancidity or off-flavors.

I don't know whether wheat flour wrappers react differently from rice flour. Perhaps that's why your wrappers were a little stiff?

You can fry the rice flour wrappers to make Vietnamese spring rolls. They are quite different from Cantonese spring rolls, which are thicker. The Vietnamese spring rolls are lighter, but a tad more difficult to handle because the wrapper is thin and fragile. I like both, but the Vietnamese ones are for family only, they don't hold up well for me so I make them and we eat immediately.

Cheryl

Hmmm, interesting Cheryl. I've always bought the brand that has a red rose on the front of the package and it says the ingredients are 100% tapioca flour. The last time I bought some, I bought the 3 Ladies brand (I think that's what it was called, they are all gone now) because they actually had rice flour in them. They were a little more sticky than the red rose ones. But I see some red rose packages online that say Spring Roll Wrappers, mine say Spring Roll Skin now. Maybe mine are imposters. I used to buy them when they came in a plastic disc cover that kept them from crumbling, but they discontinued that packaging quite a few years ago.

Maybe you use yours faster, or maybe it's just the opened packages that get rancid, but mine definitely do. And I live in the PNW where it doesn't get hot or humid, so most things last pretty well. I just stopped buying them until I need them because of it. I found this website to be informative.

Here is a link that might be useful: Rice paper tips

Olychick - I'll have to check my package when I get home. I have the ones in the plastic container - that probably tells you how old they are!

I know Andrea Nguyen's website well. I have her books on Vietnamese cooking and dumplings. Now I'm fired up to get them out and do some summer rolls.

Cheryl

I have made hundreds of these at a cafe where I used to work. I have a wide bowl about 2 1/2" deep, that I fill with very warm water for soaking the rice paper sheets. As it cools down refill with warm water.
Like susytwo I lay the soaked rice paper sheet on a tea towel to roll it once the filling is in. I dampen the towel then wring it out so it keeps the rice paper pliable while I am working with it. I place the shrimp or mint leaves that I want to be seen through the wrapper on first, about a third of the way down, then layer on the additional filling ingredients. Leave a good space at each side, about an inch. Tuck in the sides of the wrapper then roll from the bottom up. Place seam side down on a plate or tray.
When all the rolls are made, cover them with the damp towel (wring out any excess water) to keep them moist until you are ready to serve them.

I stopped at a Vietnamese grocery store on my way home and checked the rice wrappers. I found a variety of brands and some variation in ingredients. Many of the packages have red roses on them, but no "Red Rose" label. One listed only "rice flour, salt, water" for ingredients. Most of the others listed "rice, tapioca, water", some with salt, some without. None listed wheat. I don't know how accurate the labels are, but I guess that most wrappers have rice and tapioca, just as Andrea Nguyen says in Olychick's link. Mine are just rice, but that may be because they are old. They are labelled Red Rose.

I have several other packages of rice paper - all different brands that I bought at the Korean market, and they only list rice flour as a flour ingredient, along with the salt and water. I don't think any of the water is left, however. Some of them have roses on the package and some have elephants. I'll have to check what the names are, but some are made in the U.S. and the others in Vietnam. The one that falsely listed wheat flour as an ingredient was from Vietnam, and that could be an error in translation.

When I make the rolls, I fold the end closest to me first, before the sides, because that's what a recipe told me to do, and when it works, it seems to make a good seal. That's the way I make burritos also. I've been rolling the wrappers on a wooden chopping board, and if they get a bit dry, I spray them with water. The main thing I need to do differently next time is to use warmer water and have it in a bigger container. I'm going to look into buying a bowl especially for this purpose, possibly at a thrift store.

I've learned a lot from this thread - thanks!

Lars

Hi Lars
Vietnamese Spring Rolls

ingredients

1 recipe Shrimp Filling or Chicken-Crabmeat Filling
1 recipe Lime Dipping Sauce
1 12-ounce bottle warm beer
7 to 9 8-1/2-inch-diameter rice papers
1 head bibb or Boston lettuce, finely shredded
Snipped fresh cilantro
Snipped fresh mint leaves
Snipped daikon (Oriental white radish)
directions

Prepare Shrimp Filling or Chicken-Crabmeat Filling. Prepare Lime Dipping Sauce; set aside.
Pour beer into a pie plate. Carefully dip rice papers into beer, one at a time. Place papers, not touching, on clean, dry kitchen towels. Let soften for a few minutes until pliable.
Place 1/4 cup shredded lettuce on bottom part of each rice paper. Place about 1/3 cup filling on the lettuce near the curved edge of the paper. Fold in ends. Beginning at that edge, tightly roll up the rice paper. Place, seam side down, on a plate. Cover with a damp towel. Repeat with remaining filling and papers. Cover and chill up to 2 hours.
Diagonally cut each roll in half crosswise. Transfer spring rolls to a serving plate. Serve with bowls of Lime Dipping Sauce, cilantro, mint leaves, and shredded daikon. Makes 14 appetizers.
Shrimp Filling: In a bowl pour enough hot water to cover 1 ounce rice sticks and 1 dry wood ear (cloud ear) mushroom. Let stand for 30 minutes to soften. Heat 1 tablespoon cooking oil in a wok or medium skillet. Add 1 tablespoon chopped green onion and 4 minced cloves minced garlic; stir-fry for 30 seconds. Add 1/4 cup shredded carrot and 1/2 teaspoon sugar; stir-fry for 1 minute. Remove pan from heat. Drain rice sticks and wood ear; finely chop. Add to vegetable mixture. Stir in 8 ounces finely chopped, cooked, peeled, and deveined shrimp and 1 tablespoon fish sauce.
Chicken-Crabmeat Filling: In a bowl pour enough hot water to cover 1 ounce bean threads (cellophane noodles) and 1/2 ounce dried black Chinese mushrooms. Let stand for 30 minutes to soften.
Heat 1 tablespoon cooking oil in a wok or medium skillet . Add 6 ounces finely chopped skinless, boneless chicken breast; stir-fry for 2 to 3 minutes or until no longer pink. Push to side of wok. Add 1/4 cup chopped onion and 1 minced clove garlic; stir-fry for 1 minute. Remove from heat.
Drain, remove cartilage, and flake one 6- or 7-ounce can crabmeat, or thaw, drain, and flake one 6-ounce package frozen crabmeat. Stir crabmeat and 1 tablespoon fish sauce into chicken mixture. Drain bean threads and mushrooms; finely chop and add to chicken mixture.
Lime Dipping Sauce: In serving bowl combine 1/2 cup fresh lime juice, 6 tablespoons fish sauce, 6 tablespoons water, 2 tablespoons sugar, 3 minced cloves garlic, and 2 seeded and minced red chili peppers. Let stand for 30 minutes to 1 hour before serving. Makes 1-1/3 cups.

Here is a link that might be useful: vietnam things to do

In the traditional Vietnamese Spring Rolls or Salad Rolls (goi cuon), there is no daikon.

Daikon, when eaten raw, has a very strong taste. It will overwhelmed the taste of all the other ingredients in the Spring Rolls. When we use daikon as raw, we normally marinate them with a vinegar mixture. Nevertheless, we don't use them in the traditional Spring Rolls.

Ingredients are as follows:
Rice paper (dipped in warm water)

Filling:
- Lettuce, any of these: Boston lettuce, green leaf lettuce, red leaf lettuce. Using half or whole leaf will hold ingredients better. The leaf may be halved or quartered but not shredded.
- Cilantro
- Mixture of herb leaves such as Mint, Thai's basils, Vietnamese coriander, Vietnamese Perilla, etc.
- Chinese Chives
- Rice Vermicelli (bun)
- Boiled Shrimps, half lengthwise
- Boiled pork, sliced

There are several choices of sauces that accompany the Vietnamese Salad/Spring Rolls. These included fish sauce mixed in lime, water, garlic & chili pepper and various versions of peanut sauces.

Lars, as for the fried rolls, it's still known as Vietnamese egg rolls (cha gio). At least that's what on the menu in most, if not all,Vietnamese restaurants.

Although, we use the same rice paper to wrap these fried rolls, the fillings are a bit different than of the Chinese egg rolls. Wrapping in rice paper for frying is a very tricky technique. If the filling, the wrapping and the frying aren't done correctly, the wrapped rice paper will burst during frying. For this reason, many Vietnamese restaurants in foreign lands chose to use the Chinese wraps for stability during frying.

The fish sauce mixture also has sugar. The sauce is a bit savory, sweet and sour.

I normally make a quick peanut sauce. Here's how: In a sauce pan, use equal part of hoison sauce (the same sauce that is used with Pho), peanut butter, 2 parts of water or low/no salt chicken broth, a little bit of finely chopped garlic. Heat at low and stir until mixture blend together. Add finely chopped chili pepper to your taste. Sprinkle chopped roasted peanuts or you can use beanut butter that already has peanut chunks in it.

I really like the idea of these, I love spring rolls so sounds like these would be right up my street!
I have make spring rolls before so the only tip I can offer is to pack them with flavour!! Throw in some ginger, chilli, allspice etc....finger licking good!!

Welcome to the Cooking Forum George99 and Kenguide.

Those of you who have difficulty handling wet rice paper, this is the technique I use:

I put one dry rice paper on a non-stick pan and use a bristle brush to brush warm water on the rice paper. This way you can control how wet, how limp and how sticky you want the paper to get.

If you want to go faster, use two non-stick pans.

dcarch

Welcome George!

ntt_hou- Thanks for your recipe. Do you have anything more specific you can add about frying with rice paper? I'd like to try it because my wife doesn't care for the uncooked rolls. I made some when this thread originally came up a while back, before Spamguide bumped it.

Nice to see this again - I am going to have to try the beer method of soaking rice paper and see how that works out!

Thanks for the additional recipes and tips. I still have not fried the rice paper although I still want to.

Lars

Dcarch, that's a smart idea. Using a plastic surface or lightly oil the plates will also help the rice paper from sticking. Another way that works for me well is to damp the rice paper on 1 side only. Place the dry side on the plate. Always leave the damped rice paper for at least a minute to soften before rolling.

Lars, the beer method of damping rice paper is for frying method only. The pale yellow color of beer supposed to help the wrap to brown more evenly and the crisping. Notice, I mentioned damping and not soaking. Soaking the rice paper will make it more fragile and break easily instead of becoming elastic. Some cooks claim that the bubbles in the beer would actually create more burst on the wrap during frying.

Most cook are too much in a hurry to fry egg rolls. They use high heat and take out the egg rolls too soon which not allowing enough time for the rolls to crisp up.

Foodonastump, the reasons that rice paper wrap burst and break during frying are: filling was not dried enough and rolls were not wrapped tightly. These will create bubbles on the rice paper during frying and will burst.

Here are some tips:
1) The vegetable used in Vietnamese fried egg rolls should be at minimum and only use those that has little liquid in them such as shredded carrots, sliced dried mushrooms and chopped onion and/or green onion.
2) Do not soak the glass noodles in advance. After cutting them to shorten the length, add the dried noodles directly to the mixture. It will help to soak up the extra juice in the mixture. The extra juice will soften the noodles.
3) If the filling mixture becomes too wet, place the mixture into a cheese cloth and squeeze the juice out.
4) When wrapping, wrap it as tightly as you can without breaking the wraps. It does take some practice.

These are tips I can think of at this time. I'll add if I remember anything else.

By the way, the Chinese egg roll wraps do come in different thickness. Most Vietnamese (living in foreign lands) use the thinner Chinese wraps. They're as thin if not thinner than won ton wraps.

I'm not trying to attack Kenguide but rather just trying to redirect the misleading information on the recipe that was given.

There are other type of Vietnamese rolls that we use with the same rice papers. The recipe from Kenguide seemed to be taken from several different recipes and combined into one. Of course, you can chose to make however you'd like but it won't constitute as traditional and authentic Vietnamese dish.

The information I gave only applied to the authentic Vietnamese Spring/Salad rolls and the Fried Rolls. There are other rolls that aren't as known to foreigners.

By the way, never chill uncooked rice paper rolls or placing them in the fridge. This will harden the rice paper.

The filling used in the traditional Vietnamese fried rolls and the spring/salad rolls are not cooked together prior to wrapping except for the shrimp, pork and vermicelli noodles (bun). These are boiled, drained, sliced (not for noodles) and cooled prior to wrapping the Spring/Salad Rolls. The filling ingredients for the fried rolls are raw when mixed and wrapped. They get cooked during frying.

Keep left over rice paper in a ziplock bag. Remove as much air inside the bag as possible. Air is its enemy. Air dries rice papers and make them more fragile the next time you use them.