Traditional sweet flavor from North! (Bánh gai)

This is a traditional cake from North Vietnam. I've seen it many many times, whenever I travel to Hà nội, and when I go to a famous shop for bánh cốm (green rice cake), I saw this cake there but by some how I never bought it, or may be I did! Last week I saw it again, many stalls on the streets in Biên Hoà city!
I wonder why? Huge community of Northern people in Đồng Nai ?
This cake always catchs my attention and I don't know why! The way they put 5 cakes in one pack and  the red label on the top? The strange dried light brown banana leaves wrap? Or my curiosity to learn what's exactly inside that wrap?

            Light brown banana leaves wrap looks mysterious!  

              Bánh gai is always in a pack with 5 pieces and eye-catching red label on one side!  

Bánh gai or cake "gai", the name comes from the special powder made from the leaves called" gai" (green ramie). The flavor and the color come from that powder! I did check the picture of green ramie and some information about this plant. To my surprise, gai has been used for fabric production over 6,000 years! Wow!

Noodles with goat stew! Hủ tiếu dê kho!

It's funny when I heard from my friend "hủ tiếu dê bò kho"! Literally means noodles with goat beef stew! Goat or beef?
Ok, let's me explain! We have very popular noodles with  beef stew (hủ tiếu bò kho), and beef stew can be served also with bread! One of my favorite dishes!
So these two words "beef stew" seems never separated to express this kind of dish and the cooking!
What my friend means is goat stew in the same way exactly as beef stew! Because if he says noodles with goat stew, especially in Vietnamese (dê kho!) many of us may not catch what kind of dish is it!

Anyway this's a new dish to me! Noodles and Goat! So I tried it this morning for breakfast!

I like it as the goat meat is so tender, tasty, esp. its thick chewy skin!
Interesting that they serve noodles separately, it means I have two little bowls : one for noodles and another one for goat stew!

Vietnamese udon and fish cake

You still remember what I mean udon in my previous post?
It's just my simple association between Japanese udon and our big noodles! Bánh canh!
Vietnamese udon with fish cake or bánh canh chả cá is not really popular in Sài gòn compared to other dishes as bánh canh cua (Vietnamese udon with crab) or bánh canh giò heo (big noodles with pork knuckle)!

         Steamed & deep fried fish cake

              Steamed fish cake coated with duck egg york! 

Tamarind - sour, sweet, spicy snack!

In Vietnamese we have an expression about "the teenage age", we say "age of ô mai" (ô mai means salted pickled plum!), why we say that? Ô mai is one of the most favorite snacks for teenage girls!
Tuổi ô mai (age of ô mai) sounds nice in Vietnamese! But to me, we still jokingly call this age stage - the age of sour tamarind (tuổi me chua)! At this age, everything seems simply perfect for teen, but it's not true! Feelings of love, hate, anger, disappointment, first sexual encounter... start from this age!
So "me chua" or sour taste could make sense! Same as ô mai (umeboshi or pickled plum), tamarind is another favorite snack by teenage girls, and not only girls!

                     Ô mai made of tamarind, favorite sweet snack ...but in the old days.

Last week I went to bún mộc Thanh Mai and my friend told me "You should buy this one!"
What he meant is the popular tamarind stirred in sugar, liquorice, a bit of chili and sugar coated snack! We simply call "me ngào đường" (literally tamarind stirred in sugar)!

                 Tamarind stirred in sugar and liquorice, chili, sugar coated!  

To be honest, I didn't touch this sweet, sour, spicy and flavorful snack for very very long time, since I graduated high school! But today after the first bite, I instinctively keep eating! And not only me, I did offer to some other friends, they do exactly the same thing! Even asked me where to buy!

      

          A simple stall in front of popular bún mọc Thanh Mai at 14 Trương Định, right in the corner! 

Next one - also made from tamarind! I really can't remember when I tried it for the first time!  

From my primary school's canteen or a snack stall in my neighborhood? 

Anyway it was one of my favorite snacks that my little pocket money was never enough for it! 

Local specialities from Trị An!

I used to go to Singapore every month. And one day I decided to buy a good digital camera.
Learning the shopping experience in this country, esp. for the electronics, I was very clear which model I need, but by somehow a Singaporean-Chinese sale guy was able to convince me to buy another one, more expensive ...just by saying few words "we have only one life, it's short so don't regret the money!" I laughed and accepted his suggestion!
That's true! We have only one life to live! So what we want to do, just do! I did! But ironically I paid a high price for that! Believe in destiny or not but it seems everything happen in our life as it has been planned in advance!
Yesterday I went to Trị An with a friend whose the destiny was no lack of "sudden incidents"!
After many turbulent years in his life, he may prefer a quiet place, where he & his family can do what they really want despite any severe laws of life or destiny!

I heard about Trị An long ago because this's the first hydroelectric dam located only 65km away from Saigon, its huge water reservoir and the hunting activities for wild animals around this area!

After a quick swim in the huge water reservoir which looks like an ocean, we went to a huge simple stall but totally empty, right on the shore. Here they serve only those things they catch from the water reservoir and the forest nearby! We call "local specialities"(đặc sản địa phương)!  

        

     The 1st local speciality - tiny shrimps (tép) stirred in green onion, black pepper ...

    and wrapped in rice paper with rice noodles, veggies, dip in sweet fish sauce! Something new to me!

      The 2nd speciality - grilled deer meat!  

Noodles with braised duck!

Noodles with braised duck or mỳ vịt tiềm! One of my favorite noodles in Sài gòn!
It's not a noodles that we can eat every day as beef noodles (phở) for breakfast!

It's expensive and I never see any stall selling it in the morning for breakfast!
Not only because of the price (75,000 VND! - about 4 USD!) but because of the taste!
The taste is specially good, but by somehow, to me, it's not a dish with a right flavor, a right color to start a new day! Black! Especially when we look at the big duck leg, is it too much for the beginning of the day?

Noodles with braised duck is specially famous in Chinatown, as it's a part of Chinese cuisine, cooking, where the preparation requires a long time and different secret ingredients! 

I don't know exactly which ingredients are required to marinate the duck, to prepare the soup! 

What I know is that the duck should be marinated a night before in special dark soy sauce, anise, licorice root, tangerine peel...and then deep fried and braised in the soup.
The dark color of the soup probably comes from the duck marinated sauce! 

Anyway the soup is in dark color like an oriental liquid medicine, rich and tasty but it could be strong for someone who doesn't like the flavor of the medicinal herbs!  

Fish salad & dried-for-one-sunny-day squid in Mui Ne!

I've been to Mui Ne many times, tried different delicacies in that amazing seaside.
There are two dishes I always keep eating every time I go back there!
Raw fish salad with dip sauce made from roasted peanut and grilled squid! 


Raw fish salad (or gỏi cá suốt)
I remember when I tried it for the first time at Dũng Sử, probably back in late 1990s!
Talking about Dũng Sử (the name of the owner & restaurant!) I could be a "historic witness".
I met the owner, when his place was very small, opposite the beach. He said that he was forced to move around, finally he had to set down his quite poor-looking eatery in the foothills.
We loved so much his raw fish salad, we even ordered to take it back to Sài gòn. Later Dũng Sử  probably got the permission from the local authorities to open a bigger restaurant right on the beach.
I loved that place, esp. when I've been there 6,7 years ago. We were sitting like right on the sea, a fantastic view to the blue ocean shining in the sun!

His restaurant was expanded, very crowded, I met him again, a satisfied, happy man! The restaurant next to Dũng Sử - Cây Bàng was not able to compete in any aspect!
Until one day, the local authorities decided to widen the road, to clean up the beach...Dũng Sử has gone! Cây Bàng still there as the only monopoly in that area! But unfortunately Cây Bàng is one of the worst restaurants in Mũi Né. My friends and myself have very bad experience with this place: from the poor service to the very bad foods that they serve.

Anyway back to the raw fish salad, in Vietnamese I heard different versions: gỏi cá suốt, or gỏi cá mai or cá đục! I have no idea what kind of fish here, but it's raw!
It's spicy because it's topped with chili and roasted peanut. I love the sauce. The dip sauce made from ground roasted peanut mixed with something else,very tasty! I even drink it!