Savouring the exotic flavours of Vietnam
Being streetwise pays off while hunting down dinner in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi and Hoi An
I viewed street food in Vietnam with a mixture of hope and fear. Everyone said it was wonderful.
But while walking through numerous pulsing food markets, wondering from which small, glowing brazier to sample, it felt safer to avoid eye contact with vendors sitting on tiny plastic stools as they fanned the hot coals and to veer instead toward something safe. Like an unbelievably inexpensive and relaxing foot massage.
That’s why, given the pressures of time and cowardice, we opted to take three different guided tours while in Hanoi, Hoi An and Saigon — trusting savvy locals to curate our street-food experiences.
We couldn’t have been more pleased. Not all of the food was to our liking (my companion didn’t eat pork, which is a huge part of the menu in Vietnam). At least one dish — a hard-boiled duck embryo — was frankly unmanageable even for me and I eat crickets. Nonetheless, we found ourselves learning a lot and trying more than we would have if left to our own devices.
Our tour, booked through Hidden Hanoi (US$25), wasn’t specifically a food tour (nothing like that was available at that time). But our guide Nakita took us to the Hang Be market, a five-minute walk from the landmark Hoan Kiem Lake, where locals shop sometimes twice a day to make sure they get the freshest produce. There we really began to understand what was meant by street food. Not only was it prepared by countless vendors squatted at curbside, preparing everything from charcoal-fired skewers of chicken to stir-fried fresh snails, it was clear that eating on the street was the only thing to do.
Street food is cheap, a dollar or two for most items, and lots of people eat out rather than at home, where space may be cramped and dominated by many relatives living under the same roof.
In the Old Quarter, diners were perched on tiny red plastic stools that would be very much at home at the sand table in your average Canadian daycare. It was cacophonous, so people gathered close to socialize and to eat. Despite the honking horns and bark of vendors, you could still hear the bright chirp of birds housed in ornate cages hanging from roofs throughout the Old Quarter.
It was through Nakita that we discovered how to assess a really good pho (pronounced fuh) — the ubiquitous Vietnamese noodle soup sold from kiosks or carts on nearly every street corner. First, look for a vendor that just sells pho and only one kind (we opted for beef), because a singular focus means the cook is serious about the quality of that particular product. Second, watch for a broth that’s clear, not oily, another sign of refinement. And know that the meat actually finishes cooking in your bowl, not in the common pot. Do not be afraid of the tiny dishes of condiments, such as bird’s-eye chili and pickled garlic. The more flavours, the better.
In Hoi An, a beach town in the central part of Vietnam, and in Ho Chi Minh City — we opted for fullon food tours. Our guides in each city offered a quite different experience and both gave us a unique perspective on street-food culture.
Huynh Huu Phuoc, who owns Eat Hoi An, took us on foot to roughly eight to 10 different vendors, mostly in the charming Old Town. He related the vendors’ stories and explained their specialties. Some dished out their wares — a cold, sweet, black, sesame soup or a tapioca bean dessert — from a deep pot or plastic bucket. Others were literally located in a hole in the wall, some with low stainless-steel tables that our guide told us represented a sizable investment for the proprietor and therefore spoke to commitment.
It was at a little shop at 18 Thai Phien that we ate Hoi An’s signature noodle dish. Cau lau is a bowl of thick, chewy rice noodles topped with sliced pork and extras like fried pork rind and fresh mint.
Another Hoi An staple on the Eat Hoi An tour ($45) is a hybrid of the Vietnamese and French cultures known as the banh mi. It’s a perfectly baked baguette (crisp on the outside, soft and airy on the inside) stuffed with assorted delicacies, from pork liver pate, to pickled papaya, cucumbers, cilantro, spring onions and, occasionally, a fried egg.
One particular banh mi created by Madame Phuong and her family has been made famous by celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain, who sampled the sandwich some years back. Banh Mi Phuong has been lined up eight-deep ever since and one bite tells you why.
There are actually two locations of Banh Mi Phuong, one at 2B Phan Chau Trinh and another in the central food market. We visited both during our stay in Hoi An and both lived up to their storied reputation.
But it was in Saigon that we enjoyed the most fulsome food tour organized by XO Tours. XO stands for xe om, a Vietnamese motorbike taxi. XO Tours sees participants picked up at their hotels and then driven about the city’s numerous, far-flung districts by young women on scooters. Dressed in traditional Vietnamese garb, a long tunic split up the side and a pair of loose pants, the women served as genial hosts for the evening. Fluent in English, they help their individual guests crack crab legs or grill goat breast marinated in fermented tofu sauce and are able to answer all manner of cultural questions.
Our XO Tour began with a large bowl of soup called Bun Bo Hue, actually named for the imperial city of Hue and featuring a broth made from beef or pork stock, lemon grass and chilies. The noodles are thick and round, not flat like pho, and so delicious, it was tempting to gobble. Our XO Tour guide Tai, who met us at the first stop, warned us to pace ourselves food-wise; there are at least eight dishes on the tour. Happily, driving between food stops takes time and allows for digestion.
Tai buzzed on his own scooter between culinary destinations, delivering an informative presentation at each stop. He described not only the food we were eating, but briefed us about the district we were visiting, including Saigon’s Chinatown, one of the largest in the world at 600,000 inhabitants.
The tour ($75) begins at 5:30 p.m. and ends at 10 p.m. The price initially feels expensive by standards in Vietnam, where remarkable food, fashion and hotels are available at rock-bottom prices. But it was excellent value and you’ll still want to tip your driver-host.
Watching Ho Chi Minh City ( known as Saigon in most quarters) come alive at night on the back of a scooter is now officially one of my best travel experiences ever. The traffic in Saigon is sheer madness. But our hosts ably negotiated the congested thoroughfares. All we had to do was sit, our heads moving side to side like bobble-head dolls; it was hard to know where to look.
Sometimes I needed only to inhale deeply to feel the city at its core. My nostrils filled with the pungent scent of medicinal herbs as we were piloted through the part of town specializing in traditional medicine. Small, local night markets emitted powerful odours, from the charcoal of a street bra- zier, to the damp, vegetative green of produce, to the briny scent of whole, live fish swimming in buckets, fresh from the sea and the Gulf of Thailand.
Waiting at a stoplight toward the end of the evening, I observed a family of four on the scooter beside mine. Dad was driving, a baby riding in his front-body pouch as he steered his precious cargo through the neon-lit streets. A toddler slept soundly, squished between his dad and his mom, who was perched on the back of the scooter. The little boy’s thumb was tucked comfortably in his mouth. I imagined the warm, safe sensation that filled his body and had it myself, if only for a moment.