A food tour in the Hoam Kiem district

We continue to discover new breakfast ingredients.  Today, pomelo was included in the fruit, 

there was a yoghurt and fruit taster, and I tried rice noodles with shrimps, spring rolls and rau.  

 

Yesterday, I introduced Bob to Banh Tom Ho Tay at 1 Thanh Nien, opposite the One Pillar Pagoda.  Every one around us appeared to be having fried fish and vegetables, and we saw turtle, pigeon, frog and eel on the menu, but we had salt fish fried rice, 

 

sautéed pumpkin tendrils

 and tamarind prawns.  All very good food.

We have also done our usual sticky- beaking at what is on offer in the streets.  Chicken anyone?

Today, we paid US$15 to do a walking tour of street food in the Hoan Kiem district with Alissa Hoang ( check her out on Facebook).  

We booked it through the Crossing Vietnam Tour company, and for those of you who need a bit of confidence, or want to meet a local, or want to learn more than you know, it is a great introduction to local food.  Each food  type we tried was really great - Bob's favourite was the pyramid cake while I loved the pillow cases.  Alissa said that she would be happy to go with us should we like to explore more food stalls another night, and we might take her up on that!

We started with an old favourite, Nem ( spring rolls)

 at Thanh Hop at 12 Dinh Liet street, which were served with a sauce made from fish sauce, sugar, lime and garlic.

Next, we tried Pyramid cake/ bang gio, which is steamed rice with a pork filling, in Dao Duytu street.

This was followed by another old favourite, Che, a sweet soup which was very refreshing, at a family business which has been going since 1930 on the corner of Hang Thiec and Ba Dan.

The beer cafe was booked out, and we had already had beef pho earlier in the day

 

with tiny little sour limes and chillis 

 

 so our next dish was banh goi/ pillow cases, with fresh herbs and pineapple sauce at Ly Quoc Su street.

We were pretty full, so we called it a night after egg coffee ( cap phe trung) at the Ca Fe Giang, though Alissa was perfectly happy to keep going.

By the way, apologies for not including the correct accents in my written Vietnamese.  My computer acumen is still very limited.

Eating up-market at Halong Bay versus eating middle-market in Hanoi.

In Hanoi, we have continued to experiment with breakfasts.  This is congee, a sort of rice porridge which is very bland, but if you add these ingredients, 

you have a very tasty breakfast indeed.

Another choice is fried sweet dumpling with bacon - a mixture of East and West

 

Still another is spring rolls and stewed cabbage

and yet another is creme caramel:

 

On our tour of Halong Bay, with Paradise Cruises, we were also offered, among other breakfast dishes,  beef pho (which was a bit bland, and the beef a bit chewy)

 

and prawn dumplings and vegetables and noodles.

 

 

 The policy on the cruise was that the word diet was banned, and they certainly offered a lot to eat.  Lunch had a lot of salads, including  prawn, jellyfish and chicken.

 Mains included squid, morning glory, basa dish and fried rice

 I was happy because I love seafood, but I think a lot of the guests weren't so impressed, even thought there were lots of other choices, including Western ones.

Desserts were equally assorted and included fried bananas (which Bob thought had been fried in pork fat), fruit, creme caramel and strawberry jelly.

 

Off the boat, Bob saw a vendor of starfish, snails and other seafood items.  Not sure if they were food or not!

  

At night, we had a cooking class, so I have a recipe for you!

 

Deep Fried Spring Rolls

Ingredients:

 

Filling ingredients:

500g pork mince

150g grated carrot

3 egg yolks

50g finely chopped onions

30g finely chopped shallots

5o g  rice vermicelli which as been soaked, then drained and roughly chopped

30g dried mushrooms which have been soaked drained and finely chopped

30g dried fungi (wood ear mushroom) which have been soaked drained and finely chopped

 20g finely chopped garlic

50 g finely chopped mint and coriander

20ml fish sauce

pepper and salt

Other ingredients:
Rice paper
3 egg whites
frayed stem of lemon grass

Sauce ingredients:

I dessert spoon fish sauce
5 dessert spoon water
sugar
garlic, chopped
lemon
coriander and mint, chopped
chilli, sliced

Method:

Mix the filling ingredients well.
Rub each rice paper with a damp towel, them use the lemongrass as a brush to rub on egg white.
Put 2 dessertspoons of the mix at the bottom of the roll and mould into a sausage shape.  Roll twice, then tuck in the sides and roll again.
Deep fry 5 to 10 minutes.
To serve, cut rolls into half and provide the dipping sauce

We met a rather lovely Spanish family on the trip and were called up to compete in making these.  Bob and I lost to the kids, but we did get our very own cooking certificates.

Dinner was scallops with a green mango garnish

 

Pink lotus seed veloute (????) soup with a crispy tofu garnish

 

Prawns and potatoes ( the sauce was a bit bland)

Australian beef with a demiglace brown sauce and crispy risotto ( the beef was amazing, and they knew how to do medium rare, but I wasn't keen of the baked risotto)

Chocolate truffle baked in an eggplant, which was actually great!:

 Once we finsihed the cruise and were waiting at the hotel for the bus to return to Hanoi, we were offered potato and sweet potato chips which were a bit soggy

and this little accompaniement

 sweet and sour glass noodle salad and fried fish cakes

 sago and fresh fruit sweet soup

 It was all very twee and rather unimpressive, designed to make us forget that we were waiting ages for a bus rather than to please the senses.

Back in Hanoi, we popped into the rather atmospheric Little Hanoi for a quick dinner after visiting the hospital. It seems to only cater for tourists and we almost walked out  ( one couple did and were very loud in their scathing comments).  I don't know if the food is genuinely Vietnamese of not, but it was bloody good.  We had fried morning glory and garlic, seafood fried rice and caramelised barbequed beef.

The verdict?  Luxury is all very well and good and I loved the rare feeling of being totally spoiled, but when you try to spoil an international assortment of fussy guests with big wallets, you can lose out on taste.  So far, the food we have had in Hanoi may not have been as pretty, but it has been far tastier.

A day in the life of a food tourist in Hanoi

I stared the day with fruit

tofu and tomato with beans

and chicken pho

 Lovely, tasty and light.

The mid morning  break was a fruit soda for me at this cafe - love the illustration.  Bob thinks the coffee in Melbourne has more depth and richness and flavour than the coffee in Vietnam.

 Tempting though these fruit were, I kept walking.

I am still trying to talk Bob into squatting at an outside eating area.

 
Instead, we tried climbing the rickety stairs at Quan Bia Minh, and had a rather bland meal of tofu with chilli and lemongrass

and vegetarian fried spring rolls.

In the afternoon we passed more hawkers of fresh fruit.  The fruit are often small, misshapened, imperfect or blotchy on the outside, but compared to the supermarket ones back home they are fresh, sweet and tasty.

 Dinner was at Madame Hien where we sat outside with the geckos and watched the chefs at work.  We tried the mocktails - yum-

 then a beer for Bob and margarita for me.  Also yum, but I proved my inability to drink by only being able to manage half of it.

 

With the help of our lovely waitress, we  chose a sample of the starters - different types of spring rolls, pomelo salad, prawns with mango salsa.

bun cha with pork, noodles, vegetables and sauce

and duck done in three ways with rice:

Too much! We couldn't fit in dessert, so we did a quick tour of the wonderful house instead, which Bob decided was much cooler and comfortable than outside.  Another visit is needed!