RICE, rice and more rice! Although at least I don't have to eat rice for breakfast here, only lunch and dinner!
In the mornings I go downstairs to a little makeshift cafe in the courtyard of our apartment block. As soon as Egg Sandwich Lady (I'm ashamed to say I never caught her name!) sees me she sets to work on making my omelette to go inside the crispy roll along with some salad. She has a tiny bit of English (mainly numbers that I believe her young daughter has taught her) and she has a heart of gold - she only charges me 8000 dong (24p) for the sandwich. She kept hold of my sunglasses for me for a whole day when I left them at the table one morning. The first thing she did when she saw me the next morning was produce my sunglasses from her bag. She also let me borrow he phone once and wouldn't accept any money for the (local) call I'd made.
When I'm at school I get lunch every day at about 11.30am. I eat with the children in one of the school rooms. The lunch is brought in every day and I believe that it's bought from someone down the road. It comes packed like a Bento box and contains all sorts of goodies! I usually have an egg in some form as I'm still not eating meat, peanuts, morning glory (which is like spinach but better and full of iron!), tofu (which I've started to love now!), cabbage, lots of rice and green leaf soup (I'm still yet to find out what the leaf is!). Lunch is usually followed by a bit of melon, watermelon or huge grapes.
Dinner is served at the office at around 6pm, before the university students arrive for their lesson with Matt. Dinner is cooked by Mr. Son's nephew who lives with us. It's usually pretty tasty. It includes more rice with morning glory that comes with a dipping sauce and egg (omelette with mushrooms usually), fish or chicken. The food is served 'family style' except it's not the same family style that I'm used to at home. At home it's normal to get as much food as you'd like on your plate, finish it and them go back for seconds if required. In Vietnam it's normal to take only one mouthful at a time from the food in the centre of the table. This means that we go back for another mouthful from the food on the table with the same chopsticks that have just been in our mouths. I always found this a little strange but that's just the way they do it!
I had some wonderful food at a vegan restaurant called Loving Hut where they tried to imitate (quite successfully) fish and pork. I have no idea how they did it but it was the best meal I've eaten in Vietnam! I also had (vegetarian) Bun Cha which was pretty delicious. They give you a plate of thin rice noodles and a bowl of soup along with a plate of 'salad'. The salad is totally different to a salad at home as it seems to include nettles and other leaves that we'd never use at home. Tastes great though! I hope to try Pho on Friday when I have lunch with Trang - it's so famous that it would be a shame if I leave Vietnam without trying it!
Fruit-wise I have eaten pineapple and mangoes here that taste divine. The pineapple is so beautiful that you can eat the centre as it's so soft! I've also had some lychees which are delicious, mang cut (mangosteens) which taste strange and dragon fruit which is very yummy. I had a pink dragon fruit which was much nicer than the white one. I've also eaten lovely watermelon and another melon that's native to Vietnam (but I can't seem to find the name as I write this). The grapes here are huge and very sweet - lovely!
In the mornings I go downstairs to a little makeshift cafe in the courtyard of our apartment block. As soon as Egg Sandwich Lady (I'm ashamed to say I never caught her name!) sees me she sets to work on making my omelette to go inside the crispy roll along with some salad. She has a tiny bit of English (mainly numbers that I believe her young daughter has taught her) and she has a heart of gold - she only charges me 8000 dong (24p) for the sandwich. She kept hold of my sunglasses for me for a whole day when I left them at the table one morning. The first thing she did when she saw me the next morning was produce my sunglasses from her bag. She also let me borrow he phone once and wouldn't accept any money for the (local) call I'd made.
When I'm at school I get lunch every day at about 11.30am. I eat with the children in one of the school rooms. The lunch is brought in every day and I believe that it's bought from someone down the road. It comes packed like a Bento box and contains all sorts of goodies! I usually have an egg in some form as I'm still not eating meat, peanuts, morning glory (which is like spinach but better and full of iron!), tofu (which I've started to love now!), cabbage, lots of rice and green leaf soup (I'm still yet to find out what the leaf is!). Lunch is usually followed by a bit of melon, watermelon or huge grapes.
Dinner is served at the office at around 6pm, before the university students arrive for their lesson with Matt. Dinner is cooked by Mr. Son's nephew who lives with us. It's usually pretty tasty. It includes more rice with morning glory that comes with a dipping sauce and egg (omelette with mushrooms usually), fish or chicken. The food is served 'family style' except it's not the same family style that I'm used to at home. At home it's normal to get as much food as you'd like on your plate, finish it and them go back for seconds if required. In Vietnam it's normal to take only one mouthful at a time from the food in the centre of the table. This means that we go back for another mouthful from the food on the table with the same chopsticks that have just been in our mouths. I always found this a little strange but that's just the way they do it!
I had some wonderful food at a vegan restaurant called Loving Hut where they tried to imitate (quite successfully) fish and pork. I have no idea how they did it but it was the best meal I've eaten in Vietnam! I also had (vegetarian) Bun Cha which was pretty delicious. They give you a plate of thin rice noodles and a bowl of soup along with a plate of 'salad'. The salad is totally different to a salad at home as it seems to include nettles and other leaves that we'd never use at home. Tastes great though! I hope to try Pho on Friday when I have lunch with Trang - it's so famous that it would be a shame if I leave Vietnam without trying it!
Fruit-wise I have eaten pineapple and mangoes here that taste divine. The pineapple is so beautiful that you can eat the centre as it's so soft! I've also had some lychees which are delicious, mang cut (mangosteens) which taste strange and dragon fruit which is very yummy. I had a pink dragon fruit which was much nicer than the white one. I've also eaten lovely watermelon and another melon that's native to Vietnam (but I can't seem to find the name as I write this). The grapes here are huge and very sweet - lovely!
Sounds fab - pink dragon fruit is indeed a lovely thing :-)
ReplyDeleteGlad you are hooked on tofu now - it will be good to keep this going in the US, their meat supplements/hormones are actually quite frightening...
I'd definitely be up for some mystery green leaf soup right about now! :-)