After the interesting grilled frog at my favorite foreign city, I headed to a Vietnamese seafood restaurant for dinner the following night. At the heart of the city, the Hong Hai (pronounced as 红海, or red sea, in Mandarin) restaurant is not particularly lavish nor it is very eye catching. However, judging by the crowd of locals congregating at this place, it must offer some pretty good and authentic seafood.
fresh fish, shrimps, and various types of clam
The restaurant was quite packed, but luckily we managed to secure a table at the balcony on the second level. My friend made the order as I would have no idea how to go about reading the 100% Vietnamese menu, with no translation nor any pictures. I doubt any of the servers speak English either.
three types of clam, including cockle (blood clam)
The first four dishes that came consists of the various types of clam. The boiled cockles (I think) were very delicious, and goes extremely well with the fried garlic (including skin) and vegetable garnish. The fresh and somewhat bloody cockles with the slightly salty but strong tasting garlic was just perfect. A salt + dried pepper + dried plum + lime dipping sauce accompany the dishes.
We also had a grilled clam and a plum sauce clam dishes. While the grilled clam is best enjoyed with the dipping, the plum sauce actually goes well with some bread. Pretty interesting contrasting taste among these three dishes, the bloody cockles, the dry grilled clam, and the sourish plum sauce clam.
oyster with cheese, and a great tasting hot pot with eel
Next in line were the two huge oyster with cheese. Though this dish isn’t something that is unique to this part of the world, the oyster served were the size of my palm. Needless to say, you can guess if I enjoyed it from the photo above.
Other than all the shell fish dishes, we ordered a hot pot with eel. As with most Vietnamese dishes, the pot came with a huge serving of vegetable consisting spring onion, bean sprout, okra, and interestingly, shredded banana flower, all arranged in a neat and pretty presentation. The soup tasted a little spicy and salty, but compliment the vermicelli noodle and the fresh vegetables. It was a very good dinner.
Pham Ngoc Thach road is located at the heart of Ho Chi Minh City
Hong Hai is located at the heart of the city, not more than US $2 taxi ride away from any major hotels in District 1. The dinner itself was somewhere around RM 50-60, value for money indeed.
Updated 22/10/2010: moved to 236 Pasteur, district 3, HCMC
Address:
54, Pham Ngoc Thach,
District 1, Ho Chi Minh City
Vietnam
Tel: 8.292977, 0908-103547
I have actually been to Ho Chi Minh City on business trip for more than half a dozen times since some three years ago, it is alway such a delightful place to visit. The Vietnamese people really does offer the very best of hospitality anywhere, and of course, the city offers some interesting food too.
clam with pork, bbq frog with skin, and bbq prawns
I managed to contact an old pal of mine, Trinh, for some drinks on Sunday night. The last I met this guy was back in August 2005 for some Banh Xeo, more than one and a half year ago. We rode to one of the nearby seafood and beer restaurant to catch up on old times.
The host ordered a plate of BBQ prawn, some interesting “grilled clam rolled with Pig’s omental fat”, and BBQ frog with skin. Of course, a few bottles of chilled Heineken to go along with these local delights.
The words mean “welcome” and “see you”.. or something like that
The food were certainly very good. The BBQ prawn was marinated with some pretty spicy seasoning, and packs a kick even if you don’t dip it into the traditional lime + salt + chili paste. The locals usually chew down everything, including the head and shell.
The grilled clam was an interesting dish that tasted kinda like bacon and clam meat, except in a bigger and juicier bite. It went very well with beer, and definitely one of the heart surgeon’s worst nightmares.
Thought I’ve had frogs before, this is the first time I’ve had it with skin intact. The texture is similar to fish skin, but tougher and slightly sticky. The aroma of the frog meat was very good as well. Fresh vegetable is featured in every dish, not very different from the Malay ulam. It is actually a very nice concept, you have some meat or seafood, then some vegetables to freshen up the tongue, repeat.
this place is just right next to Legend Hotel in District 1, HCMC
It was a very good supper, and nothing beats meeting old friends from far away places. I’m not exactly sure how much the food costs, but the pork with clam was about 55,000 VND, with another 10% tax. One ringgit equals to around 4,500 VND.
This particular restaurant is situated on
3C, Ton Duc Thang
District 1, HCMC
Vietnam
As some of you might aware, I have written quite abit about Vietnamese food such as the BBQ & steamboat. The latest installation, I bring you Banh Xeo, something akin to crepe.
We went to this place called Banh Xeo 46A, an old school place by the roadside, with extended roof however. The place is packed with mostly Vietnamese, but I did see a table of mat salleh smacked somewhere in there tho.
As you can see on the bottom 2 pictures, they serve BBQ prawn and fish too.
This is what we came for, Banh Xeo, it’s got shrimp, bean sprout, and some other stuff in it. As with most Vietnamese dishes, it came with a generous serving of fresh vegetables. We also ordered fish, and some fried pork that came with something like very soft pohpiah wrapper.
The way you eat Banh Xeo, as shown by my Vietnamese colleague.
Typical tourists never get these kinda true Vietnamese food, it was awesome.
In previous posts I have introduced you noobs about Pho, an expensive Hue meal, and vietnamese coconut ice cream and coffee. This time around I visited another excellent old school type of food establishment to have some classic Vietnamese BBQ and Steamboat kinda thing.
Don’t exactly know the name of the place or where exactly it is located as my friend zoomed through the narrow streets in the scooter bringing me there. It’s somewhere nearby District 1 of Ho Chi Minh City, and I think the place, or the food, is called Lau Ca Bong Keo, or something like that.. anyway.
The setting of this restaurant is almost like a kopitiam, but with very low chairs and tables (perhaps a foot high). Kinda cute in a way, but also very pragmatic, you don’t have to stand up to put the food on the burner or in the steamboat like how we usually do it here in Malaysia.
BBQ old school style, with charcoal like it’s supposed to be! I had marinated shrimp and a type of river catfish. My host told me the fish is seasonal, so I must have been lucky. It is served with some soya sauce and red chili. The fish tastes sweet and the shrimp.. was AWESOME. Tastes slightly salty but very, very sweet and succulent.
After the BBQ, the next dish was something like steamboat. This is served with burning charcoal and a healthy dosage of fresh vegetable such as lettuce, bean sprout and basil leaves. The main ingredient was the fish again, it was very good. While the marinated BBQ type was sweet and succulent, the steamboat with soup, brings out a different taste and texture from the same fish.
A bottle of Heineken went really well with that meal. Like Pho, this is a must try if you go to Vietnam.
Now that you’ve read about my entries on Vietnamese meals here and here, it’s time to move on to the desserts.
Now, I’m not really a huge fan of ice cream, but everytime I came back from Vietnam, my mom had always asked me “So have you had the coconut ice cream yet?” This was my 5th trip to the city, and I thought what better time than now to try it?
Coconut Ice Cream in a.. coconut, of course!
The toppings are dried logan, nuts, and that rolled up bakery thing. Fresh strawberry and grapes on the side, too. You eat some ice cream, you mix it up with some fresh coconut meat, man, this you gotta try it for yourself. It was sweet and it was great! Nevermind I had to drink about 3 glasses of water later.
Vietnamese Coffee, really black
Vietnam is also famous for it’s coffee. They come really thick and black, and they come pretty sweet too. What you see in the picture isn’t a half filled glass cos I drank some, it was how it came. Really thick that you can’t possibly drinking a full glass without instantly having caffien overdose. Starbucks & Coffeebean ain’t got nothing on Vietnamese Coffee, and it’s way cheaper too.
Oh yeah, I had to drink another few glasses of water to clear my throat and tongue. hehe
