Stickyrice

Heavy Sticky Filler

I'm sure we all have our own little eating disorders. Mine involves sticky rice. I love it and I hate it. When I'm in the mood to eat it, no other dish will suffice. I will not be persuaded along any noodle route when the sticky rice compulsion takes hold. Though afterwards, there is a tinge of regret.

But I don't vomit.

You see I consider myself to be a healthy eater for the most part but my search for just a smidge of nutritional value in this dish is futile. Nothing green in sight. Morgan Spurlock got sick on his supersize me diet and if I were to take on a similar experiment with sticky rice, I might find myself in a spot of bother, too.

Even after one occasional serve, I'm beating myself up about it. I watch as the layers of the dish are assembled and wonder about the physiological effects on my body. The rice is the mainstay, packed into the bottom of the bowl from huge bamboo baskets covered with sheets of industrial grade plastic, cloth and other miscellaneous insulating blankets which keep it hot. This ingredient doesn't perturb me. I can burn it off. But then what looks like a big yellow ball of uncooked pastry is shaved over the rice. Actually, I think it is mung beans (dau xanh) pounded and rounded, another source of carbohydrates but also protein. All good if one is training for the Hawaiian Ironman event...

...which I'm not!

And then oil is squirted on it. Not extra virgin like Jamie glugs over his risotto! No. It comes out of a re-used la Vie bottle in a thick stream through a crude perforation in its white cap. Leaves a lovely sheen on the food as I imagine it in my arteries, all the wrong fats surging toward my heart. Deep fried shallots and chicken with the skin on are added to top things off.

I reel around, salivating one second and experiencing conniptions about what I'm about to do to my body the next.

A smorgasboard of processed meat slabs, deep fried boiled eggs and other oily treats comes into view. There are no healthy choices here. I block it out.

I will eat salad tomorrow.

Xoi Ga Pho Co
Cnr. Nguyen Huu Huan & Hang Mam
Old Quarter

The Slap

As I nostalgically wallowed in the aisles and stalls of Melbourne's foodstores a few days ago, I did intimate that I was becoming a bit myopic to the food scene around me in Hanoi. Asparagus had me in a spin. I had cheese and rustic loaves of bread on the brain. I even went into one of those tiny expat foodstores in Hanoi last weekend and trotted out with poncy paper bags filled up with air-dried pasta, olives and marinated feta. Last night I was eating food matched with wine for God's sake!

What the bloody hell is happening to me?

Am I having some kind of culinary cataclysm? Is my Sticky alter-ego transitioning out of my consciousness?

I need to take a good long hard look at myself. I need a slap back to the streets of Hanoi, a good crawl in the gutter. I need to get stuck into ingredients that look like they've been raked off the grass at the park.

Wake up Sticky! Remember where you're from but write about where you are!

Alarm Bells

It's the last day of November and the word Christmas is being uttered with abandon. Bells are starting to toll.

Alarm bells!

DING! Where the hell did that year go?
DONG! Do I have to eat all that Xmas fare again in a few weeks?
DING! And drink the wine?

There's no point in resisting it so I'm getting into the spirit early at the Hanoi Cooking Centre. Tomorrow night, my silly season will be officially launched at an evening of festive wine tasting. Tracey, Linh and staff are matching some funky Christmas nibbles with wine supplied by The Warehouse.

For more details, check out the centre's website or email info@hanoicookingcentre.com

Australian Kitchen: Asparagus

 

I did eat out in Australia on my recent trip but it was the allure of the kitchen, the produce markets and delicatessans that really got my juices flowing. After almost eight years in Vietnam's markets and eateries, where fresh noodles, Asian greens, tangy herbs and tropical fruit have become familiar fodder, I now see my own country's foodstores in a different light. The normality of my Hanoi market now contrasts spectacularly with the exotica of Melbourne's food shops.

A weird transition has occurred.

My eyes popped at the simple sight of bundled asparagus spears piled high in wooden crates at the greengrocer's. In season and going for AUD$0.49 a bundle, it was incumbent upon me to purchase a truckload of the stuff and take to it in the kitchen. I would match it with other ingredients and eat this fine green vegetable until my return flight to Vietnam was called.

It's funny how I can now sing the praises of asparagus because as a kid I hated the stuff, served out of a tin, not really green and wrapped up in bread at adult parties or in a messy tuna mornay for a weeknight dinner. Yuck!

There seem to be much better uses for fresh asparagus these days. At my sister's, we briefly panfried it in olive oil, pepper and lemon juice before placing it atop a risotto with oven-roasted salmon, lemon zest and basil.

At another family gathering, the asparagus got the same treatment in the fry-pan but became the feature of the dish, loaded up with feta and parsley and a simple dressing of olive oil and red wine vinegar.

And on each occasion after these meals of asparagus and copious glasses of wine, I would visit the loo and my pee would pong. I don't know about you but that's what it does almost instantaneously to me!

Asparagus is delicious but what is that about?

Toy Street Coffee

Amongst the coloured clutter of children's play things in the old quarter street known as Toy Street, there is a coffee den. Awkwardly positioned, slightly camouflaged and really tiny, a seat in this establishment comes at a premium. In fact, it's best to carefully plan one's assault on it.

Persistent by nature, I've been known to circle this cafe like a shark, waiting for someone to vacate their stool and extract their motorbike to create space for me and mine. As the place is located in a one way street, this circling involves doing curcuits of the block burning litres of fuel. It's really best to park elsewhere and walk but even then there is no guarantee of a place to park one's body. The sure-fire strategy is to hit the place between 11am and 1pm, when the locals are feeding their rice holes and then sleeping it off. I must say though that I have noticed an increasing number of Vietnamese foregoing their afternoon siesta in favour of the caffeine alternative.

The coffee here is a sweet, rich but subtle blend served in classy glassware, delicately ridged and a good fit in my hand. Even though the girls who make the coffee are mere teens, they have been very well-trained to produce consistent coffee every time, which is one of my imperatives in a cafe. In all of my regular haunts, I know the cup I'm going to get. When I'm nursing it, tinkling with the ice and anticipating the liquid on my palate, I know what it's going to taste like. It's a comforting thought. In fact, venturing to new cafes can be traumatic, risky business.

As I sip my coffee, the traffic whizzes by, a passing parade of sweating and lost tourists, too. Across the street, toy negotiations are undertaken and cheap Chinese-manufactured playthings are clutched tightly by kids on the back of motorbikes, ready to be assembled, broken, discarded and their small parts swallowed all over Hanoi.

Cafe Huong
37 Luong Van Can
Hanoi

Curbside Workshop

A stiff fishy breeze lingers about this old quarter street at night. Daytime business shutters go down, giving way to a line of street stalls and narrow corridors offering up a snack that is prepared in a noisy workshop-like atmosphere.

There are tools about - not your typical cooking utensils, not a spatula in sight!

Instead, picture ye olde blacksmith shoppe, where hammers and hot fire are at play, though not to fashion a fire stoker nor a horse's shoe. Here the material to be fashioned is edible sea creature of the cephalopod family

Rigid leathery dried squid are propped up to attention on display stands up and down this stretch of old Hanoi. Single light bulbs shed dull light on these formally jet-propelled swimmers now flattened and well dead.

Once selected by the consumer, the squid hits the workshop floor for its transformation into food. Placed over a small hot box of red coals on the pavement, it curls as it is grilled in some kind of delayed final act of defiance against its earlier capture. The hammer is then used to batter the squid against a wooden board in an attempt to tenderise it.

It's Hanoi dining ambience at its best. The close proximity to the roar of traffic, the incessant horns, banging hammers and, as a special treat on the night of my visit, there was a special impromptu performance of street theatre, too. The stall's proprietor arrived back from an outing to find one of her young male workers asleep out the back. He shot bolt upright to receive a right royal cussing peppered with the kind of purple language one would expect of a fishmonger! The boy was dazed and still wiping the sleep from his eyes as she performed Act 2 at the front of the house, shouting a similar tirade at one of her competitors who was allowing her customers to park in the wrong "f***ing place."

Of course, I was the only one taking any notice of all this carry on.

 

Every other patron was on task, munching on their shredded muc nuong (grilled dried squid) and throwing back shot glasses of rice wine. After all the distraction, I started chewing, too. I'm not sure but maybe I chose the wrong squid specimen at the outset because I chewed and chewed and chewed until I had a wad of fishy papier mache forming in my mouth. Maybe not enough elbow grease was expended at the hammering stage. I was concerned that the squid might choke me on the way down.

I'm not going to give up on this as a culinary experience, though. I like the idea. It's a good beer match. I will try it again. Next time I will seek advice on selecting a squid which requires less jaw action.

Muc Nuong
36 Hang Bo
Old Quarter
Hanoi

Bun Cha of Choice

 

I've discovered superior bun cha.

The doorway from which it's served has been in my peripheral vision for a long time. In fact, I could've been wolfing down this fine exponent of the dish for at least six years - it's next door to one of my regular caffeine hangouts. For some ridiculous reason, I'd ignored it, thinking it shonky gutter style bun cha. My dismissal has turned out to be a huge error of judgement and, to put this wrong right, I am hereby nominating this barbeque soup vendor as my official bun cha of choice - if that counts for anything!

The husband and wife tandem and their team of young relatives from the provinces see to it that all the elements of quality bun cha are present. Herbs, lettuce and crisp white beanshoots are diligently rinsed in big plastic basins. The pork patties and chunks of pork belly are methodically arranged in wire grillers before being given the requisite charring over the hot coals. The husband must get a lot of the plaudits here as he doesn't rush the cooking process, ensuring that the meat is well done and edged in black. Nothing worse than under-cooked bun cha meat.

The wife is the chief of the operation, portioning big serves of bun (fresh rice noodles), handfuls of young papaya slivers, ladles of slightly sweet nuoc cham and the all-important meat bits. Crouched and surrounded by her ingredients, she swivels on her kiddie stool, her knees inserted into pink plastic bags to protect her floral slacks from splashes and drips. Her multi-tasking also includes the frying of the rather scrumptious spring rolls (nem), a normal accompaniment or side dish to bun cha, and doing the sums to collect the cash.

Chopped garlic and sliced chili on the tables allow the patrons to customise their dipping sauce-cum- soup. As no-one seems particularly concerned about garlic breath in Vietnam, I am heavy-handed with the former. The latter I am wary of. I like spice in my bun cha but I do take regular stock of the number of chili slices I place in my soup, as they can easily be picked up hidden in noodles or lettuce and accidentally swallowed. 

The morning after burning ring of fire is an affliction I can do without!

A further word of warning: even though bun cha is lunchtime fare, this vendor packs the punters onto her plot of pavement. One time I arrived at 11.45, only to be told that the barbeque was over. Get there early!

Brunch Money

Two serves of bun cha, two spring rolls - 50,000VND (USD$2.90, AUD$3.50)

Bun Cha
48 Pham Hong Thai
Hanoi

I've got hate-mail

I've received criticism before.

I understood that when I chose to start blogging I was putting myself up for it. It's a very public forum and food generates some very passionate discourse. As they say, "one man's meat is another man's poison." Not sure where women fit into that idiom but no doubt they have their own significantly more complicated one!

Anyway, in the four years that stickyrice has been inhabiting its tiny, cruddy corner of the blogosphere, my dozen or so loyal followers have kept me honest, correcting me on the detail and giving me a subtle tongue-lashing if I push the wrong buttons here and there. I appreciate it. As an expat commenting on a foreign cuisine and culture, I do try to tread fairly carefully. I don't actively seek to patronise or belittle the locals nor do I want to be branded a wanker by those from other shores.

But it's happened. While in my inbox this morning I opened an email entitled 'great blog', only to be greeted with the following vitriolic spew:

"it's always so much fun to listen to a pretentious, self-important
expat brit try to work out his colonial complex by fawning over
primitive cultures.  wake up.  no amount of sycophantic swooning will
ever change the fact that asians will eat anything that doesn't crawl
out of the bowl before they can get a chopstick into it.  asian
cooking is the truly the antithesis of food as art.  the emperor isn't
wearing any clothes and for all your pretending to the contrary, pho
is not ambrosia from the gods--it's thin noodle soup.  get over
yourself."

I'm loathe to admit that it's quite articulately expressed vitriolic spew. I also love the fact that my critic has simultaneously managed to attack me, pho, Asians, Asian food and, just for good measure, the Brits. And all that in under 100 words, which must come close to some kind of Guinness Book Record for concise but sweeping invective.

What I am just a tad confused about is why this magnificent tirade wasn't posted in the comments for all to see? Not enough pluck, eh? A bit shy maybe?

Well, John Cain (I believe that's your name?), in the spirit of a public forum in which I am the main contributor, allow me the right of reply. Firstly, I feel sorry for you, your family, friends, colleagues and even acquaintances...in fact, anyone who comes into even passing contact with you. You are obviously a deeply unhappy person.

Secondly, fuck off!

And just for the record, John - not that I'm the slightest bit patriotic - I'm an Aussie, arsehole!

Rainy Day Noodles

The Spot: Not far south of Hoan Kiem Lake, this is French Quarter pho in one of Hanoi's main gridlines, Hai Ba Trung St, almost opposite Tran Tien Plaza, a shopping centre which not so long ago was a place where the truly wealthy shopped and the rest came to marvel at the escalators and the airconditioning. Now, all around there are electrical goods outlets selling TVs bigger than drive-in movie screens and stereos which can be turned up loud enough to drown out Hanoi's ambient noise - no mean feat! The Spotted Cow (now Jo Jo's) used to be next door and Hanoi Cinematheque is up a lane over the road.

Space and Atmosphere: On a rainy day, it's all ramshackle plastic sheets, blue and orange tarps and corporate beach umbrellas strung over the pavement keeping the patrons dry. Everyone's thankful for the rain and there's definitely a smiley warm fuzzy interaction thing happening between the servers and the slurpers. Weird. Nice weird!

 

Shopfront Style: It's a typical rustic Hanoi street scene with the scratched up ochre walls and ancient green doorways leading away to dark mysterious places where scarey toothless grannies squat and even rats fear to tread.

Sticks, Condiments and Crockery: A touch of innovation is in evidence here in the form of large custom-made metal tubs holding the sticks, on the top rim of which a little baby tub has been welded to hold the toothpicks. I wonder if they've got a patent on that one? Standard on all other fronts, including the floral china from China.

Serving Station: Noodles are dunked and separated in the light of day before disappearing into the dimness of a dark corridor where all the prepping of meat and clipping of spring onions is done. Portions are arranged and the bowl re-appears for the final, vital step: a ladle and a bit of the stock floats the ingredients and delivery is imminent.

Meat Generosity: A flattened cake of cowflesh hit hard with a cleaver sits centre of my bowl slowly losing its rawness and pinkness with the heat of the soup. It's large.

Service to Delivery Gap: The rain has slowed trade and the staff are at their best. I'm still settling into a position on my stool under my beach umbrella pulling my feet out of the weather when the product is set down steaming in front of me. Prompt.

Stock Factor: It's a warming shot of comfort that matches the kind of day it is perfectly.

Cost: 50,000VND (USD$2.80, AUD$3.45) or so for two bowls with tea and quay donuts. Slightly on the high side of the average.

Rank: "For me, it is the best pho in Hanoi," said the comment from Chi, whom I must thank for the recommendation. More recommendations most welcome!

Chasing Porky

Between the slaughterhouse and the butcher, Porky was going pillion on a Honda Dream, albeit in a slightly unorthodox position and in defiance of Vietnam's helmet laws.

This was worth a chase.

I was driving and the god was on back with the viewfinder at his eye. The whole scenario had a touch of the papparazi about it, the pig playing the celebrity part well. The flailing limbs could 've been mistaken for a wave and every left turn saw the trotters scrape the bitumen. Dramatic stuff!

Porky's chauffuer was not so impressed by our pursuit and started driving like Henri Paul. Weaving in and out of the dire traffic on Hanoi's Dai Co Viet Street, he was mindful that we were drawing attention to him and his fat mate. I was mindful that I may never be presented with this photo opp again as the powers that be have earlier this year decreed pig pillion passengers illegal, dead or alive. Apparently, Porky must now be taken by specialised transport which is licensed by veterinary departments and meets specified safety and hygiene standards.

But the citizens are protesting and the Ministry of Justice is on their side.

Every day I love Vietnam a little bit more.