Ho Chi Minh City
Thinking back,
Few years ago,
With only some basic knowledge on Vietnamese language and tradition..With minimal understanding, and with my scanty insight of the country of Vietnam,I stoutheartedly bought myself a back and forth airfare to Vietnam, on my own, to search among the precocious Vietnamese chefs to work for my Vietnamese restaurant back in Sibu.
On the flight to Ho Chi Minh City, I kept wondering on how this old historic city looks like. In my imagination, this city is like a place with traders moving around with basket selling daily essentials..
An old lady carrying items to be sold..
Motorbikes on the streets.
But when I arrived at the airport, my former chef which who is also a close friend of mine, picked my me up from the airport by motorcycle with his bike. Frankly, that was my first time in my whole life riding on a bike in a city! But yea, it was fun experience and I must admit that it was indeed a thrilling experience! As we ride through the city, I could see thousands of bikes roaming on the streets. And you can see, with the artery jam packed with bikes, and only bikes! I can barely see any four wheel vehicles around on the ride. Well, this was rather an alienated setting for me as this is not a common panorama in Malaysia. In Vietnam, don’t be bolt from the blue if u see the bikes outnumbered the cars by a huge propotion.
And one more interesting driving/riding scene that i can see, to my surprise in the city was that all the motorcyclists were riding without helmets and were not getting caught by the police.~ Cheers! .Or perhaps it is legal in Vietnam? Hmm.. Well, whatever, that’s pretty odd in any sense for a Malaysian. =P
“Vietnam’s street, a non stop boulevard with streams of motorcycles.” Quoted from kelvinsse™
Thank God~! I thought I’d end up in an old town with salted fish and padi plantaion everywhere..
As I can say, the city centre was a place where everything gets really busy ..
City centre, Ho Chi Minh.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s still cars and lorries in the city.
Statue of Vietnam’s General Tran located near Dai Lo Ham Nghi Street.
In the middle of the city, there was 1 bronze statue that caught my attention.. It was a huge bronze statue that was dedicated to General Tran ..
Tran Hung Dao was worshipped because he was the national hero who led the Vietnamese people to a resouding victory over the Mongol aggression. He is still their national pride until this day.
According to Wikipedia ,Vietnam was under Chinese control for a thousand years before becoming a nation-state in the 10th century. That is the reason that their traditional custom are very much influenced by the Chinese traditions.
Vietnamese Beef Noodles. Bun Bo
The famous Vietnamese Beef Noodles. Which I can say is the best beef noodles I’ve ever tasted in my life. Thick, tasteful and large sized bowl. and it so cheap! USD0.70 for a bowl of noodles. Where can you can that in Malaysia?
Vietnamese Rice Noodles
The Rice Noodles are one of their signature food.. It is one of their staple food, you can see variety of shapes of rice noodles. And they are lot of ways to cook it..
The most expensive lunch I’ve ever had in Vietnam.
We went to a restaurant which was suggested by my tour guide after my visit to one of their local park.. and the place had battalions of tourists queining at the entrance. When I finally found myself a seat in the restaurant after queuing for like half an hour,I have my buttock rested contentedly on the chair and started to browse through the menu. Well, another quandary, the menu is all in Vietnamese! Approaching another tour guide of mine anew, I asked for a flavor to translate the menu for me. Kind enough for her to subservice me upon the food ordering noesis in Vietnam.
Sauteed Fried Pork
The sauteed fried pork is very good and tender I can say..It’s nice.
Stir-fried veg with squid
This is the vegetable (Sawi) which we can always get in our local market.
Deep Fried Kaloi Fish.
When the waiter served this on the table.. i felt like my eyeball was dropping out of the socket.. Oh my God~!.. In Malaysia, Kaloi is one of the favourite fish for the pet lovers. and now Fresh Kaloi Fish , Deep Fried… ended up on the dining table.. Oh yea, to my surprise..Kaloi doesn’t taste as disgusting as i thought before..it taste so tender and sweet..
My tour guide explained to me that this fish is netted from the nearby river. She added that in Vietnam’s river, Kaloi is often caught on the net by fishermen.
This lunch cost me around USD23+ which is around Rm80+ at that time.
A night out at
Beef Salad – Bo Guoi
Vietnamese are famous for their “Guoi” which is we known locally as salad. The different between Vietnamese and Malaysia salad is that we always use Mayonnaise. Even in our Salad Chicken Rice, adding a bit of Mayonnaise on the chicken, we assumed it as Salad Chicken. We are sometimes very confused society.
Prawn salad
This is another “Guoi” that I ordered. In this servings, they added a lot of “Nuc Mam” which is locally know as fish gravy. It taste wonderful, light, simple and nice. Love it.™
After the dinner with my chef I bounced back to the hotel to wait for another friend of mine to pick me up for the next round of my dinner.
Ingredients for Vietnamese Spring Roll
He introduced a friend of his to me which is operating a restaurant some where in the city. He showed me his Spring Rolling skills.. He suggested that his friend could be the right candidate for me to choose as my chef. Besides having a first hand experience in Vietnam, one of my reasons here is to scout for chefs to work in my restaurant back in Sibu.
These are the varieties of herbs that are often use as the ingredients inside the spring rolls. Some of the herbs might not suit our local taste. It’s minty and some are bitter.
Next destination, hawker stall. Food here I come! lol
Hawker ..
They hawker food here has a lot of delicacies. And they are so cheap too.
My chef suggested me that I should try the chicken egg which he said is very well-known here. It’s famous among men that wanted for a “boost” for the night. but to my surprise…the egg that he wanted me to try wasn’t egg as in cook, boiled or, fried.. Instead.. its fetus of a chicken..
Crack it!
Eat it!
After that we went to MGM ..it is so executive that no cameras are allow in this premises.
MGM Saigon
MGM Saigon is one of the hottest hang out place in Saigon. It’s so pack with youngster. The interior is so nice, the ambient is so relaxing and the environment is so chill. I like the way which MGM is build. It has a casual bistro one the lower ground. Second ground is music cafe and the upper ground is dance floor, where you can drink and dance your night away enjoying the music and looking at handsome young macho and pretty young ladies.
After our the night at MGM, we went to a street to have our supper.
Grilled claims.
There are also huge variety of claims and sea snails for your to choose from.
Tips to have great and cheap food in Vietnam.
1. Do not dine at places where you see a lot of tourist dining-in.
2. Eat at the street. Some places are not very cosy but you’ll be amazed by the food.
3. Have a walk around the city centre and look around. You find what fits your stomach.
4. Old-fashioned and small shop which is packed with people are a place that you should never missed. Places like these are usually shop which had already been operated for a long time and well known for their food.
