Rice noodles with jellyfish at Lạ (bún sứa)

Jellyfish or we call sứa in Vietnamese, to me it could be one of the most beautiful sea creatures that I have seen. Maybe not those red jellyfish in Vũng Tàu that hurt me in my childhood summer vacation but at least those that I saw in a special tank in a famous spa in Tokyo. There, in the relaxing top floor they keep extremely white, extremely beautiful jellyfish in a nice glass water tank with the ocean dark blue background, the special lighting. Just imagine sitting in a cold, dark room, hearing the sound of ocean waves and watching those white fluorescent jelly fish swimming as they perform an exotic belly dance in the water, all heavy feelings in my mind suddenly have gone! Only me, alone, bathing in the ocean with these miraculous creatures! That was in Japan.

Back to the reality, in Vietnam, we eat jellyfish, we do jellyfish salad and jellyfish rice noodles! Ok just think Japanese kill bigger fish for their sushi, and here we have jellyfish - much smaller for our noodles...in order not to feel uncomfortable!

I did try jellyfish salad, quite popular dish at certain seafood restaurant but my jellyfish noodles at Quán Lạ last night was my first time! It was good, very good!

          Jellyfish noodles but some tuna, fish cake are added and topped with roasted peanuts! 

          Here we go: chewy jellyfish in a dipping sauce - fermented fish sauce (mắm nêm) 

         I love the taste of the soup: a bit sweet, a bit of pineapple flavor, a bit sour, a bit spicy...

So if you want to try, here you go the address:

Quán Lạ - 61 Lê Thị Hồng Gấm! 35,000 VND/ bowl! Worth to try!