Street snacks - bicycle ride to discover - Part Four

Sàigòn is changing, a lot!
My old Sài gòn was quiet, more peaceful, more calm and charming!
Sài gòn today is vibrant, joyful, full of good and evil!

One afternoon, I got time and decided to ride on my very good bicycle around the city. To see, to feel and to smell new things that I probably pass by in my routine day!

Heading to district 10, where I often see many stalls of grilled sweet potato, I catch no one. Still early for business? Grilled sweet potato reminds me a winter day in Beijing, when I was on the way to Great Wall. It was really freezing morning, sitting in the bus, through the window, I bought a grilled potato from street vendor!

I follow the stream of cars, motorbikes to Cách Mạng Tháng Tám street, then turn to Nguyễn Thị Minh Khai street to check my favorite Vietnamese kebab but it's closed when I reached there!

No kebab, I stop by a stall of fresh fruit juice - opposite, to quench my thirst with pomelo juice. It was small place before, selling mostly orange, pomelo, centella (rau má) juice. Now bigger stall, richer choice!

Stall of freshly squeezed fruit juice 

I'm impressed by the number of fruit juice they have here. Freshly squeezed juice from apple, pomelo, mango, pear, water melon, centella (rau má) to carrot, winter melon (bí đao), star fruit (khế), aloe vera (nha đam)...I just wonder do they mix with water? or purely squeezed fresh juice? Business secret? 

Whatever you name, they have here! 

Continue my ride along Nguyễn Thị Minh Khai street, to the round-about, I arrived to my old high school. Established in 1927, was renamed few times, from very French "Collège de Cochinchine" to Petrus Ký, and now Lê Hồng Phong, my school, an old French style architecture, was filmed in French movie "The Lover". Its surroundings were very quiet, calm in the old days, always in the shade of big trees! That picture has gone totally!

Now the street is full of street vendors, selling "bánh tráng trộn" to students!

Mixed rice paper or rice paper salad or bánh tráng trộn is rather new street snack, I heard that it appeared here around 10 years ago! It's a mixture of rice paper, green mango, shrimp salt, beef jerky or stir-fry dried shrimp, peanut, chili sauce,  fried shallot, squeezed kumquat juice...I didn't tried, but judging by the number of hawkers here, I guess this should be a very popular snack among students! 

I turn right to a large street - An Dương Vương. This street was also quiet before but now at night is full of street hawkers, selling from grilled octopus, corn to famous bizarre balut (hột vịt lộn)...with street performers, especially late at night!

But before that, I have enough time to grab a pack of Vietnamese cherries (sơ ri) at the corner, a healthy fruit snack for many students, quite difficult to find a student who never carries this fruit in their backpack with chili salt!

Vietnamese cherries, very rich in Vitamin C! 

The last stop in my riding is famous "grilled corn" (bắp nướng) stall. In the old days "bắp nướng" was my favorite. The smell of grilled corn nicely covered by greased salted green onion attracts you  irresistibly, esp. in the cold days! Nowadays to meet different demand, different taste, the vendor added in his menu another dish - stir-fry corn with dried shrimp, fried shallot, green onion, chili sauce...it should be another yummy stuff!

Stall of grilled corn and stir-fry corn! 

Only two hour ride from my house to certain places in the city, how many street snacks we discovered?
I 'm sure that I pass by many others without notice in my afternoon ride!
Ok, see you next time for the ride!