Gill Oriental: May 2012

We did a street food tour that was highly recommended, however some of the stuff was pretty hectic! I ate some things that I'm still shocked about! However the tour was awesome, Hanoi Cooking School was fabulous and Ling, our guide (chef), was wonderful!

Ruou ran - this is Vietnamese snake rice wine. A lot of the Vietnamese men drink it. Its 50% alcohol and "APPARENTLY" it cures everything from blindness to impotency.....

Very Soviet style still...soldier holding a grenade and gun with the big star above him!

Walking past all these places on the way to the cooking school. TIT Jeans - everyone needs a pair!

Then walking past the bakery with all the delish cakes....

Finally to Hanoi Cooking School and The Bookworm - same place!

Firstly, traditional Vietnamese breakfast...chicken noodle soup!

By the way those orange things are eggs that were still inside the chicken...they have no shell.

The broth...all it is, is chicken stock, garlic, ginger, shallots and onion boiled in water for 3 hours. After that, they strain everything, add cooked noodles, pieces of chicken breast, spring onions, coriander and fresh onion, Voila...

The breakfast of champions!!!! They serve the soup with green tea (iced) and savoury donuts you dunk into the broth. Its quite nice!

Yes, you eat everything with chopsticks! Looks good though...It was terrifically good!

Before you eat it, you squeeze some lime into it, you add a spoon of rice vinegar and chillies to taste and there you go...Breakfast is served!

In Vietnamese this is how you say chicken and beef soup!

Then we walked down the road past all the fruit...

Yummy mangoes...

Vietnamese plums...

Grapes at 180 000 Vietnamese Dong per KG - what a rip off!

Litchis...

And then finally into the market...Look how big the cucumbers are.

These are bamboo shoots.

Crabs...they tie them up otherwise they run away!

Squid...they cook these all over the streets on skewers over an open fire.

Clams by the gazillion...baskets and baskets everywhere...

Massive prawns - they looked so good!

This didn't look too good... pigs intestine...in case you were wondering!

Fresh fish....like really fresh, still swimming fresh!!!

Silkworm larvae...apparently its quite a common thing to eat...

Fresh water snails...and they are massive!

Peppers, more up my street!

After the market we got dropped by taxi at this place, which literally means chicken street, because everything sold in the street has something to do with chicken! LOL...

They gave us these pancakes made from rice batter, with chicken and mushrooms inside, topped with dried shrimp and crispy fried shallots, you then dunk it into this yummy sauce and it is absolutely divine!

The rice batter.

The pancake!

The pancakes!

The final product! Grab some chop sticks and get stuck in!

Close up...Looks delish...

The sauce you dunk it in to.

OK, and then I did something I didn't think I would ever do...yes I ate some bug...yes, one of these bugs!

They chop it up and put it in some sauce.

You take your chopsticks...pick it up...put it in your mouth...chew slowly...pull funny faces...look super worried...and then its not so bad!

I classified things like this as a cockroach...apparently this is a cricket in Vietnam...its very popular and very expensive!

This is a video of me eating the cricket...LOL

The restaurant menu!

An array of Vietnamese things...

Street food market...

HUGE...by the millions! I ate some...after the beetle I figured I had nothing to lose!

Tofu and green banana soup.

Pork skewers...served with noodles and tamarind and green papaya.

This is how they serve snails: Tofu and green banana soup, cooked tomato in pork stock, chopped snail and fresh spring onions, add chilli and tamarind to taste and then go for it. Well the broth is great and everything was delish except for the snails that taste like dirty Mekong river mud and have the same texture as a Dunlop car tyre. The smaller ones were less chewy...sort of like a tennis ball maybe!

So, I drank the broth and left the rest behind!

This restaurant / stall has been going for 70 years...it has been passed down from generation to generation.

Then it was onto dessert: Absolutely amazing and delicious beyond belief!

Sago...in a sweet sauce - SUPERB!

Corn mixed with something...

Kidney beans in something sweet.

Pomelo skin in sauce.

Not sure what this is!

This looks like eyeballs in soup with sesame seeds but its not. Its jelly stuff with coconut inside in a sugary sauce with sesame seeds. Absolutely delish and divine and terrific!

Jelly cubes...

Purple sticky rice - its the most yummy thing ever!

This is some type of rice thing...looks pretty dodge. I didn't try.

This was my pudding - purple sticky rice, sago, the eyeball thing and coconut cream...YUUUUUMMMMMMMMMM....

After dessert, as if we hadn't had enough already, they took us to the Bia Hoi Ha Noi - which means Draft Beer of Hanoi.

Ling and Kyle - you say "Nong" in Vietnamese which means cheers!

Ka Mohn means thank you!

2 girls from Aus that were with us - Liz and Amber! Really nice people!

Smiley Kyley and Me!

It's good beer! They drink it by the gallon!

And finally, the last stop...traditional Vietnamese coffee...

We stopped at this tiny little coffee shop that goes up 4 floors and they served the most incredible coffee...I had to buy some to send home!

This is that weasel coffee...you know the one that the weasels eat (civet coffee or Kopi luwak) and then defecate and they charge an arm and a leg for...yes thats the one!

No, I didnt have any. Beetles and dam snails were bad enough...I draw the line at feces.

Anyway, this is the coffee they gave us.

1) Coffee mixed with condensed milk, plain yogurt and crushed ice.

2) Coffee and condensed milk poured over ice.

3) Vietnamese coffee with hot milk.

All of them are absolutely divine!

They make this coffee with this weird strainer thing that fits over the glass, you put 5 heaped tea spoons of coffee in it, pour hot water to fill it up and then you push the lid down and it produces the strongest, most delicious coffee you've ever tasted.