Vietnamese and Thai cooking are, in this chapter, the same lesson taught five different ways: aromatics have a ceiling. Galangal, lemongrass, kaffir lime, tamarind, fish sauce — every one of them has an extraction window beyond which the flavor turns bitter or flat.
Bobby’s instinct is to add flavor by adding more aromatic. The chefs in this chapter understood that aromatics are not additive — they are calibrated.
Five times, the calibration was the win.