Ethan Lim’s family members were apprehensive about the Cambodian fried chicken sandwich.
But the Cambodian fried chicken sandwich is among a trio of newer sandwiches for which Lim has drawn upon his family’s own home cooking. It made its debut in early August, just as the hysteria surrounding Popeyes spicy fried chicken sandwich set off, and featured a skin-on chicken thigh marinated in the foundational herbal spice paste known as kroeung—here, lemongrass, garlic, galangal, turmeric, and makrut lime leaf—along with fish sauce, soy sauce, and sugar. It’s dusted in rice flour, deep-fried, and topped with a sweet-and-spicy papaya salad with chopped long beans and a bouquet of herbs: Thai basil, cilantro, culantro, mint, and, once in a while, when he can find it (or has grown it himself)—fish mint, diep cá, as it’s known in Vietnamese, a plant that somehow marries terrestrial herbal freshness with briny aquatic funk.
Nothing irritates Lim like when he sees a dish on a menu described as “flavors of” a particular cuisine, only to find it tosses in a few representative ingredients and barely approaches the depth of the original. “I want to make it so someone that’s Cambodian can come out and recognize a dish even if it’s in sandwich form.”
Scratch toppings such as the latter are important to Lim, serving as binders between the protein and rolls Lim gets from Highland Bakery. This is his standard sandwich vehicle, with a crackly exterior but enough tensility to contain unruly fillings normally allowed to spread out on plates or in bowls.
4356 W. Armitage, Unit B 872-802-4920hermosarestaurant.com
