I had booked two food tours, the second one for the morning. For this I had to catch a taxi to the city. Unfortunately there was some kind of obstruction near the bridge and my taxi had to take the long way around on another bridge. Fortunately Vietnamese taxis are relatively cheap.
My guide, Dung, told me that I was the only one on the tour that morning. We started off with some bò né, meaning avoid the beef, because it comes on a sizzling plate.
At the next place we had bánh cuốn, savory rice rolls and bánh bèo, water fern cake, although those look like rice noodles in the picture to me. This was accompanied by sữa đậu nành, soy milk, which is consumed all over Asia.
At a coffee shop, we had cà phê, which needs no translation. Vietnamese are crazy about coffee, there are shops all over the place. Possibly because it's a producer nation. The coffee was made by filtering hot water through grounds in a metal container with a wire mesh at the bottom, dripping onto condensed milk. When you ask for milk with coffee in Vietnam you will get condensed milk. It was strong and full of flavour.
At a local market, the other one to the Han market, we had nước trái cây, fruit juice; mine was some kind of sour fruit.
By this time I was quite full so I asked for a light snack. I mentioned that I had bánh xèo already so I think she crossed it off her mental list and instead took me to a place serving nem lụi, BBQ pork sticks and bò lá lốt, beef in a leaf. It came with rice paper and salad. But I forgot to take a picture of them. There were so good that I asked for the leftovers to take away and had them for dinner later.
Finally we finished up with dessert: chè thập cẩm, mixed bean sweet soup and chè xoa xoa, jelly sweet soup.
The great thing about Vietnamese food is that each area has their own variations on dishes. It's also a healthy cuisine as they use a lot of vegetables.
Along the way I had an interesting conversation with Dung, who explained a lot of things about Vietnam.
I took a taxi to the Tomodachi House in the middle of Da Nang city. Da Nang has about 1 million residents and looked modern and bustling. After a shower and a nap I walked to the meeting point for the tour starting 1700. I had a few minutes to spare so I wandered down to the Han River where I had a view of the Dragon Bridge.
The guide, Anh, was already there. We waited for a while for the other members to turn up. There were two Aussie brothers from Adelaide, one from Ho Chi Minh City, hoping to get a teaching job, and a Dutchman teaching in East Timor. The first thing we ate was bánh mì, Vietnamese baguette sandwich, two types, one with the pork roll and another with anchovies. This shop baked their own baguettes and the bread was crisp. According to Anh, the ratio of liver to meat affects the taste and some stalls put in too much liver.
Next we went to a restaurant for mỳ quảng, Quảng noodles. This was served with two sauces, frog and eel. I was sure this place was near my hotel and as I discovered later, it was just next door.
We went to a cafe for cà phê dừa, coconut sorbet with coffee. Anh started showing us some card tricks he was learning.
Next we adjourned to a restaurant in an alley, which we would never find on our own, serving bánh tráng nướng, grilled rice paper with beef and quail eggs. As normal in Vietnam, tables and chairs were low.
For the final restaurant we hailed a taxi to a restaurant on the other side of the river where we had nghêu nướng mỡ hành, BBQ clams with peanuts, which you see on the table, and mực chiên mắm, squid fried with fish sauce.
Then the hotpot main with cá bớp um nghệ, cobia fish with turmeric and banana. The raw bananas were sliced discs with the skin on. The flesh tasted like cooked sweet potato and the skin was simply like any vegetable fibre. I liked the side of rice paper with black sesame seeds. Also on the table is tôm sú rang me, tiger prawns in tamarind sauce. The Tiger beer probably comes from a brewery licensed by the Singapore parent.
To finish off we returned to the other side of the river, near our starting point, where we had dessert of kem bơ , avocado with coconut ice cream. Anh did a few more card tricks and the group played several rounds of Tiến Lên, which is considered the national card game. Certainly people at other tables knew it and offered advice to players.
At this point the others, except Anh, wanted to go for drinks. It was past my bedtime so we split up and I walked a couple of blocks back to the hotel.
