 If you had to choose, what is the most Vietnamese dish? If you are a Vietnamese expat, what would make your mouth water the most just thinking about? What is the food, the smell, the taste that when you see or hear some stranger is savoring, you’d immediately think, “hey, he must be my fellow countryman”? One of my friends lives in Freiburg, Germany. There is one Vietnamese restaurant 1 km away from the University, der [...] Continue reading Year in, year out, savoring the savoriest of pork  Vietnamese Something occurred to me within the last month: I probably should learn to pair drinks with food, but I hardly drink anything beside water and soymilk. Now I would *love* to learn about the different kinds of water, but living in the city makes it a bit difficult, and soymilk can’t be paired with everything like wine (yet). Coffee, alcoholic beverage, juice? Didn’t quite catch on. So what does that leave me? Tea. [...] Continue reading Black tea rice  Sometimes my craziness surprises myself. I woke up one morning, reflecting that the week’s been warm, and decided to make mul naengmyeon (물 냉면). Weeks earlier, I bought the buckwheat noodles but never had the time to cook, or the mood. Now I still don’t have time to cook, but today is the day. I remember the main ingredients of a true Korean naengmyeon, but just to make sure that I don’t have them, I look [...] Continue reading Korean chilled noodle soup with a few Vietnamese twists  Early September. Monday night. An adorable meal that combines various elements of two Far Eastern cuisines. The parts harmonize, the mixture represents a cuisine of its own: the kind that you can only find in a home kitchen and enjoy with friends in the living room. We sit on the floor, we share twelve courses plus some, we listen to a record of traditional Vietnamese instrumental, we drink chrysanthemum tea in wine glasses. We talk fooding. [...] Continue reading Dinner with Rau Om  Every time I ride the bus on Telegraph, Kang Nam Pho stands out to me like a supernova. (There are these “sorta” cosmologically important exploded stars that have been on my mind for quite some time now, which is an excuse for the sparse blogging of late.) I’ve seen Chinese-owned pho places, but they never have a Chinese name. Pin Toh on Shattuck, which used to be Phở Hòa, has pho cooked [...] Continue reading The Koreans make good pho  Taro and sticky rice pudding with coconut milk If you don’t like taro, I don’t know if we can be friends. I used to be aghast when people asked me what taro was. It’s a root, like potato, you know? Then slowly I realized that I was the obnoxious one for not realizing that not everyone is Vietnamese. But when you grew up with something so abundant, don’t you get the feeling that everyone else must have [...] Continue reading Taro and I  Do you like soy milk? No? Well, someone once told me that if you don’t expect milk when you drink soy milk, then you’d enjoy it. Yes? Then you might just prefer this luscious, green, liquefied nourishment to soy milk. Not only is it nuttier, mung bean milk also feels more natural and more local than the modern soy milk. From the cheap plastic bottle with a green plastic cap and no label (that means no [...] Continue reading Sandwich shop goodies 17 – Mung bean milk  Vietnamese Of my two hundred fifty some posts so far, this Sandwich Shop Goodies series brings me the most joy when writing and also takes me the longest time per post. It’s a collection of the bits and pieces that cost next to nothing. You may say why of course, how can a mere grad student afford The Slanted Door, The French Laundry, or our local Chez [...]
Continue reading Sandwich shop goodies #15 – Bánh quy (turtle mochi)  It’s not the black stuff they throw on your pizzas or the green thing they toothpick on your sandwich. How many of us city kids have tasted the tartness with a tiny sweet afterpunch of this Mekong delta fruit? It’s addictive like fresh squeezed orange juice on a summer day. Speaking street tongue, it’s nature’s crack in oblong shape. Eat ‘em fresh with chilipepper salt, or candy them with sugar and heat, it’s how kids down [...] Continue reading Candied cà-na (white canarium or Chinese olive)  This month sees some of us travelling and visiting families for the Lunar New Year, so thank you all for spending time to write up your delicious pieces, which surprisingly comprise a very balanced and harmonious mix of courses, recipes, and reviews. Appetizers From Los Angeles, California: Hong and Kim, the Ravenous Couple, slices out a beautiful assortment of papaya, carrot, daikon, garden herbs, and (my personal addiction) dried anchovies, in [...] Continue reading Delicious Vietnam #10 – February Essen |
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