#Travelflation: Airport coffee AU$11 / US$7 / vnd170k. Tan Son Nhat International Airport, Ho Chi Minh City, October 2023
The cup, lid, stirrer are non-plastic – glad to pay extra for that!
The price we pay for that caffeine hit at the last coffee kiosk “oasis” at the airport boarding gate 😄
Pedestrian v Vietnam main road.
At night.
With full travel insurance.
Hopefully.
Pho Ever: a bowl of pho sums up eating in Vietnam. Healthy & delicious.
The bean sprouts and Vietnamese mint & “sour” leaves are a good daily source of fibre, too.
vnd45,000 / US$1.80 / AU$2.90
Be the Master of your own Food Destiny: don’t ever let anyone tell you how food should be eaten – enjoy it how you like.
Korean fried “oyster pancakes” & side dishes, in Vietnam: firstly, sampling the individual portions (delicious) – and then mixing them in one, big tastebuds free-for-all! Superb.
A dozen oysters & condiments, enough for 2 people.
Hodori Korean Restaurant, Tân Binh district, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. vnd310k (US$12.60, AU$20). October 2023
Coffee Oasis: “green screen” of water mist, ferns & fronds give shelter from the constant traffic.
Early morning in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam October 2023.
Bring on Electric Vehicles.
* Video best viewed with sound OFF 😄
Sticky #rice balls for breakfast. With sweet candied ginger.
I’ve been good too: had my 2 slices of wholegrain fibre bread first!
#RealTravel in Nha Trang, #Vietnam, October 2023.
“One of the best meals I’ve ever eaten”: how often do we say/write this, on our travels?!
On today’s long morning walk, hungry for a late breakfast/early lunch, wander down the winding Núi Môt hem (alley) near the Big Roundabout in Nha Trang’s Lộc Thọ, to discover this bright, new family gà (chicken) eatery, “Cóm Gà Núi 1”.
The menu pic does not deceive – if anything, the pic understates the quality, presentation and size of the meal.
The thigh/leg quarter portion is huge! Cóm Dùi Roti is crispy skin BBQ chicken with a tomato glaze, steamed rice with a warm, creamy home-made mayonnaise, dried shredded chicken skin, cucumber and steamed carrot/parsnip(?), Vietnamese mint, a side dish of the family’s sweet chilli & garlic sauce, and the palate cleansing little bowl of hot soup.
It’s too much! I put half in a take-away container. Easily two meals, for vnd120,000 (AU$7.70, US$5).
Oh, and on the next table was a container of live mealworms – for extra protein?
“Vietnam never fails to please” 😊
“Broken rice”. Though lacking the visual marketing appeal of a celebrity, it is perfectly normal tasting rice that has been a bit battered in the production process.
Not unlike my good self, one might say!
It is the rice ingredient in many processed foods (eg baby food) – and makes for a good value meal in South-East Asia.
This is one of my favorite lunches in Vietnam: simply steamed broken rice with a thinly sliced BBQ pork “chop”, fried egg, cucumber salad (mild kimchi is trending in 2023, for South Koreans tourists), shredded dried pork skin and a little side bowl of hot salty, fishy soup. vnd55,000 (AU$3.55, US$2.25) in a popular eatery or half that at a street vendor.
Yum.
Is seafood still cheap in South-East Asia, do I hear you ask?
How much is a lobster in Vietnam?
Well, I do a “lobster price update” each time I visit … a cooked lobster “on special” in Nha Trang, October 2023 is vnd719,000 (AU$46 or US$30).
Mind you, it is served with a garlic butter sauce.
I just might indulge in lunch tomorrow!
(*Please do NOT put cheese on a lobster. That is an insult to both the lobster and the fromagerie 😄)
If it looks like a tomato, and feels like a tomato, it must be a tomato. Right?
Wrong.
It’s an over-ripe Vietnamese persimmon. Idiot. 😄
Hey, it was a hot day in Nha Trang, and I was tired, and they WERE the shape of tomatoes!
Oh well, it’s not going in my cucumber salad lunch – but it’s sweet and juicy and won’t go to waste …
Haxtrax 