- Indiana Soybean Alliance and Indiana Corn Marketing Council board members attended two cooking competitions promoting U.S. meat products last week in Vietnam.
Cooking competition showcases versatility, quality of U.S. pork
Eight of the top chefs from across Vietnam created a dish using U.S. pork spareribs during the 2023 Pork Stars Challenge hosted by the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) in Ho Chi Mihn City. The competition aims to highlight pork as the center-of-the-plate choice.
Social media influencer Tri Phan said the event created a great experience for young Vietnamese chefs, allowing them to showcase their creative cooking skills.
“This space is best described by the word “blend”, a blend of Vietnamese ingredients and pork imported from the United States combined into unique culinary artworks,” he said. “The competition requires contestants to create the best pork dish, using typical Vietnamese ingredients and quality pork from the United States.”
Tran Van Tuan won first place. His first dish featured U.S. pork simmered in sugarcane and mulberry sauce followed by pork cartilage that was rolled in coconut pepper sauce.
The second prize winner, Le Nguyen Anh Khoi, created U.S. grilled five-spice pork ribs with charcoal sticky rice. His second recipe was U.S. pork cartilage salad served with crispy vegetables. Nguyen Chanh Than won third prize for creating curry pork rib with vegetables served with pandan leaf rice as well as stuffed pork and ground mushroom wrapped in flower dough leaves.
Supporting export programs through USMEF like the Pork Stars Competition remains a priority for ISA and ICMC.
Corn and soybean growers raise the crop used to feed livestock and ultimately benefit from increased usage and demand for U.S. pork. As there is more demand for U.S. meat products internationally, there is more demand for Indiana crops, returning value back to the farm gate.
Farmer leaders attending the event included Carey McKibben of LaGrange, Steve Phares of Albion, David Ring of Huntingburg, Scott Smith of Windfall, and Mike Beard, of Frankfort.
McKibben says Vietnam continues to be an emerging market, and the cooking competition helps promote U.S. pork in a rapidly growing economy.
“The middle class in Vietnam is growing, offering opportunities for the U.S. Demographically, it has a younger population with the average age of 33 years old,” he says. “They seem to enjoy and think favorably of the quality of U.S. products and are demanding more. We need to make sure we’re developing these relationships in Vietnam and supplying quality product to build and maintain markets.”
He says it is critical for ISA and ICMC to develop relationships through programs, like the Pork Stars Challenge, to expand U.S. markets.
U.S. red meat exports in 2022 used nearly 38 million bushels of Indiana corn. The exports contributed $1 per corn bushel value. U.S. pork exports in the same year used seven million bushels of Indiana soybeans. The exports contributed $1.94 per soybean bushel value.
Young chefs in Vietnam try their hand at preparing U.S. poultry dishes
Indiana farmers also attended a poultry cooking competition in Vietnam hosted by the USA Poultry and Egg Export Council (USAPEEC).
The Best Poultry Challenge brought 14 culinary schools to Da Nang to participate in a final cooking competition round with U.S. poultry products. In the final round each team was required to prepare a freestyle main dish and regional specialty dish using U.S. chicken.
Trinh Tuan Dung and Van Phu Phuong Dung from A Au Culinary School in Ho Chi Minh City won first prize with two dishes inspired by the Mekong Delta cuisine in Vietnam. The dishes are grill roll chicken with spicy coconut sauce and chicken porridge with star gooseberry leaf.
Cao Viet and Pham Nhat Hieu from Danang Culinary School won second place. The first dish was a chicken siphon consommé with river leaf creeper and fermented bamboo shoots. The second dish was a chicken wellington with bamboo charcoal powder and filling made with chicken, wild mushrooms, baby corn, lemongrass, chicken bone sauce, and pureed sweet corn.
Nguyen Hoang Thanh Thuy and Luu Thi Dong from Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and Education (HCMUTE) won third prize. They created grilled chicken served with coffee sticky rice and pan-fried chicken and dragon fruit salad served with kumquat sauce.
USAPEEC says the cooking competition recognizes that culinary students are the future of the foodservice industry and aims to increase demand for U.S. poultry by increasing awareness and favorability for the product among them.
The competitions were livestreamed on social media platforms to bring awareness of the quality of U.S. products to consumers in the country.
In Vietnam, consumers purchase meat in outdoor markets. U.S. Products can be found in newer, larger retail stores. Because frozen chicken found in retail stores looks different than the whole chickens displayed in the outdoor markets, the cooking competition helped highlight that the frozen chicken can also be cooked in a traditional Vietnamese style.
As the largest market for U.S. poultry among the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Vietnam is an important place for the competition.
“Vietnam has experienced strong economic growth rates over the last three decades giving citizens the ability to afford more meat protein than ever,” according to the USAPEEC. “With its strong economic development progress, sizeable and young population, dynamic foodservice and retail sectors, Vietnam presents an attractive emerging market for the U.S. poultry industry.”
USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) was present at both cooking competitions as well with “United Tastes” branding to promote U.S. agricultural products in Vietnam. Andrew Anderson-Sprecher, a senior agricultural attaché with the USDA, attended both events and spoke about the importance of promoting the benefits of U.S. pork and poultry products in this vitally important and emerging market.
Indiana Soybean Alliance and Indiana Corn Marketing Council also sponsored the poultry cooking competition. Soybean and corn growers benefit from a growing poultry industry.
“The U.S. poultry and egg industry is the largest user of U.S. soybean meal and corn meal by a livestock group, accounting for 56 percent of all the soybean meal and 33 percent of all corn meal produced in the U.S., USAPEEC says. “…more exports of U.S. poultry and eggs mean more value-added exports of U.S. soybean meal and corn meal.”
In 2022, U.S. poultry and egg exports accounted for 149 million soybean bushel-equivalents, including 12 million soybean bushels from Indiana. The exports accounted for 300 million corn bushel-equivalents, or 21 million corn bushels from Indiana, worth $6 billion.
Indiana corn and soybean checkoff organizations began investing in the Vietnamese market in 2021. There has been growth since that time. U.S. poultry exports to Vietnam increased from 97,961 metric tons in 2021 to 118,152 metric tons in 2022, or an increase of nearly 21 percent.
Learn more about we are investing in growing new markets for corn and soybeans:
