April 22, 2025—Stepping out of the Tân Sơn Nhất International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City at 5am after a 16-hour flight, I resisted the temptation to shout, “Good morning, Vietnam!”
It would not have interrupted anyone’s rest.
The streets were already filled with cars and an ever-present herd of scooters, all making their way through 80-degree heat and 60% humidity.
I was the guest of Harry and Helen Nguyen, owners of five Phở Hà Nội locations in San Jose.
After writing about two of their restaurants, I had befriended them, and they surprised me one day by announcing that they wanted me to try “real Vietnamese food”—which meant they were going to take me with them to Vietnam and arrange sponsorship for a non-stop flight through Vietnam Airlines.
I had never been out of the country before, and don’t spontaneously run off on adventures. I hate to fly, but this chance was too good to pass up.
And the Château Lalande de Gravet 2020 Saint-Émilion and Marquis de Sade Brut Champagne served on the (very long) flight made it more than tolerable.
One of my hosts’ goals for the trip was to attend the third annual Bánh Mì Festival in Ho Chi Mihn City’s Le Van Tam Park as they researched importing the distinctive bread for their restaurants.
But with six days in the former Saigon and four days in Hanoi, I had plenty of time to explore.
Here are five things that emerged along the way:
Bread shaped like reptiles and crustaceans
We arrived at the festival just before the opening ceremonies. As a guest of two of the event’s sponsors, the Nguyens and Vietnam Airlines, I was ushered into the VIP section and given a goody bag filled with sauces, seasonings, and two breads shaped like a turtle and a crab.
It also meant I was seated across from the Chinese Consulate General, but our interaction was limited to polite nods of the head.
Edible critters were very much a theme. After getting through the crowds of people on scooters trying to push their way through the barriers, like the lemmings at Woodstock, the festival’s entryway was lined with sculptures of the Chinese zodiac, each one surrounded by bread versions, including an amazing effort at a cobra reared to strike.
Of course, the event’s focus was bánh mì, which has long served as Vietnam’s ubiquitous everyday sandwich.
A small percentage of rice flour is added to a standard bánh mì wheat dough, producing a shiny, crisp crust with almost razor-sharp edges.
While bánh mì sandwiches can be made from any ingredients, the festival focused the ingredients on the more traditional, including sliced pork loaf, pate and fresh crunchy veggies.
ABC Bakery, Vietnam’s largest, had the biggest and busiest booth, with long lines of customers for its sandwiches and desserts, including cakes and pastries. About a quarter of the booth was occupied by portable ovens cranking out a steady stream of bánh mì loaves to meet the demand.
Nguyen Thi Khanh, the chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Tourism Association, estimated the event’s attendance at 200,000 visitors, telling me there were more than 150 booths, with the bread stalls selling an average of 4,000 loaves a day.
Featherfish and peanut worms (because man does not live on bánh mì alone)
The first place I ate in Vietnam was Cơm Niêu Sài Gòn, which the World Culinary Awards named Asia’s Best Culinary Destination. Packed with atmosphere, it was once an old French Colonial mansion designed to look like a Chinese temple, with heavy red-painted wooden pillars and beams.
My hosts and I sat in the inner courtyard under the branches of ancient bougainvillea and tried phở with peanut worms, pork rolls, battered and stuffed pumpkin flowers, swai fish, wok-fried crab, and feather fish in fried rice batter.
I visited the restaurant four more times, with no hope of making a dent in its seemingly inexhaustive menu. Every dish justified its reputation.
Featherfish became a favorite during my stay. One dish at another restaurant involved wrapping the paste back into the fish skin and baking it with the head reattached. I also enjoyed a slightly sweet and oddly shaped green called Hoa thiên lý, or Tonkin jasmine buds, which seemed part of every meal.
The Nguyens lived up to their promise of showing me the spectrum of the country’s cuisine, from $3 phở with pork at a tiny grill house that seats eight to a high-end wagyu feast at a Japanese yakiniku house.
On the days I had guides, they gravitated towards their favorite places, often ones they had haunted as students. Those were some of my favorite meals, enjoying noodles and broth and seeing their pride in sharing what was, for them, the comfort food of their youth.
The joys that follow someone saying, “You’ve gotta try this”
While I looked over the cocktail menu at the Hotel de l’Opera bar in Hanoi, the bartender turned it back to the first page and said, “You’ve gotta try this.”
It was the bar’s namesake drink, La Fée Verte (The Green Fairy). Summoning my inner Rimbaud, I gave it a try.
A mix of absinthe, egg white, angostura bitters, and a squeeze of lemon, the rich star anise flavor of the forbidden liquor came through beautifully.
Another discovery was Lady Triệu Vietnam Gin, which I first had over ice with tonic and a basil infusion.
My favorite was the small-batch Lady Triệu Vietnam Dalat Flowerbomb Gin, which is made with Italian juniper, lotus flower, jasmine, cubeb and chrysanthemum.
The brilliant scent of the botanicals transmutes to a sweet and rich flavor that is both familiar and hard to place. I am still kicking myself for not picking up a bottle to take home.
Beer is the drink of choice at most restaurants and street shops. The most common ones I tried were the light-tasting 333 Beer made with Hallertau hops from Bavaria and yeast inherited from the French; Bia Saigon Special, a refreshing beer made with barley malt and Yakima hops; and Bia Hoi, a very affordable low-alcohol beer that seemed to be everywhere in Hanoi.
On the more exotic side, I was offered some locally fermented beverages on Phoenix Island in the Mekong Delta. The banana whisky and coconut wine were both around 28 proof and subtly flavored with a strong alcohol burn.
I was also offered snake wine, served out of a bottle that contained a small cobra, which I was already disinclined to try, a feeling reinforced by my guide warning it would infect me with evil spirits.
The Hồ Thị Kỷ Night Market
After the sun goes down and the city cools—slightly—the place to be is the Night Market on Hồ Thị Kỷ Street, a seemingly endless collection of flower vendors lining both sides of the narrow passage.
I arrived at 6pm, when the finishing touches were being put on displays, and the sight and aroma were almost overwhelming. An abundance of flowers like lilies, orchids, chrysanthemums and roses were available as cut flowers, bouquets and arrangements.
It is like walking into every garden ever, all in one place.
A parallel alley has become an equally huge venue for small food shops and street carts. Hundreds of people sit at tiny plastic chairs and tables while the ever-present scooters and delivery trucks fight for right of way down the narrow space.
For slightly more than a dollar, you can get anything from avocado bánh mì, spicy rice Tteokbokki, boneless chicken feet, spiraled deep-fried potatoes, papaya salad with crab, octopus on a stick, or a large cup of durian ice cream with fruit.
While the atmosphere seems chaotic, the individual stands have enough of a stable presence and fixed locations to permit customers to order food delivered by turquoise-uniformed GrabFood scooter drivers, the Uber Eats of Vietnam.
The government partly subsidizes the street stands: Anyone with $200 for the stand and license, about a third of the average monthly wage, can get one and keep it for as long as they maintain the business.
Ancestors’ appetites
The level of prayerful devotion shown to statues displayed at temples and parks wasn’t what I expected to see in a communist country.
There was a heartfelt homage to historical figures and their legends that was simply an honor to observe.
At the One Pillar Pagoda, for example, those giving birth would ask the spirit of Emperor Ly Thai Tong for a son, a nod to his successful prayers to the Bodhisattva Quán Âm.
At Ngoc Son Temple on Hoan Kiem Lake, a kind word to stuffed remains of the last two of the lake’s famous turtles might lead to a longer life.
The usual offerings left at the base of statues and in niches in the temples included bottles of water, boxes of tea, small-denomination bills, and towers of stacked fruits, including pomelos, Asian pears, mangos and a Buddha’s hand.
The devotees to Confucius brought Coke Classic, Orion ChocoPies (a Korean version of Scooter Pie) and cigarettes. In Hanoi, the offerings at the base of the monumental statue of Lý Thái Tổ, the founding emperor of Lý dynasty, included a Kirin strawberry latte, more cigarettes and one item I had to search out: blueberry ice cream Oreos.
There is no whimsy or irony in the choice of items.
They stem from an honest desire to share a favorite item or two with those in the afterlife and, hopefully, gain their attention and favor.
It is done with solemn sincerity, full hearts, bowed heads and ignited incense.
Photos were taken to remember the visit; I was pressed into service several times by iPhone wielding monks.
I would not hesitate to return to Vietnam, especially Hanoi, which is a beautiful city filled with history, tradition and culture.
What made the trip most memorable, however, was not the food or the sightseeing, but the constant friendliness and kindness of the Vietnamese people.
One case in point: I had to go to a doctor with a sprained knee, and a friend of Helen’s took a day off work to ferry me back and forth.
When we were done—five hours later—she refused my offer to pay her for her time, but she consented to me taking her out to lunch.
We went to Cơm Niêu Sài Gòn and had a feast, with her selecting dishes I had not yet tried.
When the bill came, she took it from the waiter and paid it over my protests.
Turning to me, she said, “Welcome to Vietnam.”
Robert Eliason is a documentary photographer and photojournalist and has been based in San Juan Bautista for the last 12 years. Recently he has been doing extensive reporting on the wineries, breweries and specialty food companies of San Benito County, and is documenting the history of the Cienega Valley wine region.
发表回复