Themost common English translation of “Chả giò” is spring roll, thoughthis is just a fancy name since the food has nothing to do with spring.

Ingredients

The main ingredients of a roll of “chả giò” are commonly seasonal ground meat, mushrooms, and diced vegetables such as carrots and jicama, rolled up in a sheet of moist rice paper.The roll is then deeply fried until the rice paper coat turns crispyand golden brown. The ingredients, however, are not fixed. The mostcommonly used meat is pork, but one can also use crab, shrimp, sometimes snails (in northern Vietnam), and tofu (for vegan chả giò).If diced carrots and jicama are used, the stuffs inside the rolls are alittle bit crunchy, and match well with the crispy fried rice paper.Nevertheless, the juice from these vegetables can soon cause the rollsto soften after only a short time. To keep the rolls crispy for a longtime, mashed sweet potato or mung beansmay be used instead. One may also include bean sprouts and ricevermicelli in the stuffing mix, yet, this is a rare practice. Eggs andvarious spices can be added based on each one's preference.

“Chả giò rế” is a rare kind of “chả giò” that uses “bánh hỏi”(thin rice vermicelli woven into a sheet) instead of rice paper. Thestuffs inside the roll are the same as normal chả giò, and the roll isalso deeply fried. Since the sheets of “bánh hỏi” themselves are notvery wide, and the rice vermicelli is too easily shattered, “chả giòrế” rolls are often small and difficult to make. They are only seen atbig parties and restaurants.

Side notes

Atsome restaurants, “chả giò” is incorrectly translated in English as"Egg rolls", and sometimes "Imperial rolls". Egg rolls aresignificantly different from “chả giò”, as the wrapper is a wheat flour sheet instead of moistened rice paper.However, many Vietnamese restaurants in America have adopted the wheatflour sheet to make their “chả giò”, since it makes the rolls harder toshatter when fried, and the rolls stay crispy for longer time.