Eat & Drink like the locals, Ho Chi Minh City

The next you want beer in VN, try saying ba ba ba. It's not a booze for sheep but a local white beer ( pilsner ) that is commonly enjoyed by all. My new found French friend also commented that this beer can also be found in gay Paree but it's an abbreviated "33" over there. If any of you Parisians are reading this, could you let me know if this is true? I sure didn't see no "33" when I was there.

To see more delicious pictures of Vietnamese food, click on b'packer's hcmc page

The best thing about those trips out of HCMC is the opportunity to savour really fresh food from the rural areas. Well, thanks to really helpful tip from a VTer, I went to a Mekong Delta excursion organised by Sinh Cafe and had the opportunity to try a fish with a strange name.

Favorite Dish: It's called the "Fried Elephant Ear Fish" . Sounds really out of this world right? Well, before you expect a fish with two gigantic ear lobes, let me just say it's actually a normal fish with lots of protruding, spiky scales .

Well, this spiky bugger is fried to a golden crisp and made to stand upright on lots of greens and spring onions s.haped like flowers. That's not all though, a waitress with really deft hands will tear pieces of the fish out with chopsticks and wrapped the flaky flesh inside a delicate rice paper with lots of basil, mint and vemicelli.

This treat cost about USD6 and thanks to the new Japanese friends I made during the trip, I had a free taste. Best roll I've ever tried!

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According to a Viet Kieu (that's overseas Vietnamese for you ) I spoke to, it takes an average of half an hour to drink the local coffee and 1 min to drink a cup of java in the US. Well, I don't know how many times he must have scalded his tongue in the process but he was right about the local coffee...

Over here, Vietnamese love to use a fancy coffee strainer that makes coffee drip out in an agonisingly slow fashion. So, too bad if you're a Type A. In any case, it's worth the wait . The coffee is thick but excellent .
Think Italian expresso. One shot of of this powerful drink is enough to propel you to the moon. Perhaps, this explains why all the motorists over here drive as though they're competing in the grand prix.

Favorite Dish: You can find coffee everywhere but tell them that you want VIETNAMESE COFFEE. They'll serve you instant coffee since they think we foreigners love this soot-tasting invention.

Tip: Take the coffee with condensed milk like the locals. Since the composition is about 40% milk and 60% coffee, this drink will make probably your eyeballs roll backwards. But heck, it just doesn't taste the same with fresh milk. Dilute it with hot water if you must.

Double Tip: If you want to buy back some of the delicious coffee, pop over to BenTanh Market and get freshly ground coffee that comes from "BUONMETHUOT". That's the premier coffee district and all coffee beans from there are roasted in butter! Needless to say, I'm addicted to this fragrant smelling joe

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Other than Goi Cuon, the commonly seen cold spring rolls, you could also try Cha Gio Chay , the fried version. I had mine in the Mekong Delta region, along with the famed Delta rice which is supposedly very flavourful because of the good flood waters...

Favorite Dish: This spring roll is fried to a golden crisp and stuffed w/ tofu, cellophane noodles, black mushrooms, carrots, served w/ lettuce, mint, etc.

To see more delicious picture of Vietnamese food, click on b'packer's hcmc page

If you have not eaten Goi Cuon, or the steamed spring roll, you have not been to Vietnam! What is it? Well, yummy pieces of pork, prawns, vemicelli are tightly wrapped around a delicate white skin known as 'rice paper'.

Favorite Dish: Spring rolls make an excellent light, late-night snack. Just pop over to Ben Tanh in the evening ( yes you read that correctly) , go to the right side of the market where you'll see a long row of stalls and order the rolls from anyone. It should cost less than a dollar.

To see more delicious picture of Vietnamese food, click on b'packer's hcmc page

Thanks to Shrimp56, I've decided to list out delicious recipes collected from all over the world. Here's my own recipe for good Vietnamese Beef Pho. Hopefully, it taste just as good as one found in Pho Hua. However, this looks like Greek to you, you're better off enrolling in the Vietnam Cookery School. It's situated in town and it cost roughly USD30 to learn how to cook good Viet food. Click on my link below for more details.

Favorite Dish: Pho Bo Recipe - Get the ingredients from a Thai or Chinese supermart. If you're living in Singapore, you can get all these ingredients from the Thai Supermart in GoldenMile Shopping centre.

Ingredients
Soup
1/4 cup thinly sliced peeled fresh ginger
1 medium onion, sliced
3 1/2 pounds oxtail, cut into 2-inch pieces
One cinnamon stick
6 star anise ( this is a spice )
1 tablespoon sea salt
1 teaspoon light soy sauce
One 1-inch piece Chinese yellow rock sugar
+
12 ounces, sukiyaki beef
+
Garnish
A basketful of Thai Sweet / Holy Basil, Saw Pine Leaves, Mint Leaves, Sprouts, Sliced Bird's Eye Chilli and Thai Lime Wedges
+
Dried Pho

Now, I just love preparing the Soup the night before in my slow cooker, so that it'll be full of flavour the next day. To start, sautee the onion and ginger till onion turns transluscent. Brown the ox tail next . Transfer the ox tail to a slow cooker and pour 3.5quarts of water. Stir in the spices, salt and sugar. Cook overnight.
To serve, soak noodles in hot water till its soft. Blanch it later with hot soup. Dry it. Arrange beef slices on top and pour searing hot soup on it. Garnish and serve.

Believe it not, Bill Clinton once made an impromptu stop in one of the Pho shops in HCMC. Kinda like how he would make a pit stop at Mac's in the US. Well, since this wasn't the US, I'm quite sure that he gave all his agents instant cardiac arrests. Along with that, he also made the owner of the shop very, very happy. Snapshotos of the former United States president shaking hands with the owners take the pride of place on a wall, along with more than 7 press reviews.

Favorite Dish: I popped in here more out of curiousity. The pho here pales in comparison to Pho Hao. Not only was the soup msg-laden, the herb serving was paltry and the beef nonedescript. Maybe they should have called this place "MacPho" in honour of Clinton.
I staggered out of the shop after I finished my meal as my heart went hippity-hop, post-msg . So much for celebrity endorsement !

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Don't bother eating Chinese food the next time you're here in Vietnam, it just doesn't taste the same. I made this conclusion after I ate three Chinese restaurants here, one mid-priced eatery, the other near the War Remnants Musuem and yet another at a haute cuisine joint that came complete with a violinist..all were forgettable.

To see more delicious picture of Vietnamese food, click on b'packer's hcmc page

I'm going to hate myself for this. This little gem has the best won ton soup anywhere. I can eat 3 bowls per night easily at this place. The price is only 8,000 dong for a won ton soup with egg noodles and vegetables. The family that runs the place makes the noodles during the day and opens up for 5 pm

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In the Ben Thanh Market is a section where you can have a snack, or even have a full meal. I do not specially want to recommend to westerner stomachs to refill here, as many are quite sensitive. . . . Well, I think there is no danger Montezuma will revenge here, as the food is fresh, renewed all time, there are many customers, so, the risk is minimum. And if you just have a soup (I had a noodle pho with meatballs), there is no risk, as the food is cooked and very hot (in both senses of the word!).
But there are also lots of other dishes, from the classical nems to rice dishes, vegetables. . . . I did not see grilled fish here; so for a snack, why not?