Au Lac House

Au Lac House is a new restaurant which has just opened on Tran Hang Dao virtually around the corner from my house. Run by the same people who run Au Lac Café, on Ly Thai To opposite the Sofitel Metropole, this version is located in a big old French styled mansion that is reputedly owned by a doctor given the house as reward for his magnificence in war. Evidently he still lives here somewhere though I am not sure where.

The house is fantastic, a mixture of dark woods and beige on the inside, relaxed and stylish...yet beige. Now don’t get me wrong, I enjoy stylish and this restaurant is very stylish, it’s just that this is stylish in a beige way. Richie Benaud loves this colour and has achieved godlike status carrying it off, so let’s just settle on ‘conservatively stylish’ as a description.

We stop by in the lunch hour, quite late for Vietnam at the outrageous hour of 1.00pm, so the restaurant is quietening down, but the crowd that remain comprise a well heeled, well dressed Vietnamese bunch. We are led upstairs to the inside dining room which also has a magnificently deep balcony with chairs and tables, closed off today to keep out the sticky heat, but on a cooler day no doubt glorious.

We order a beer, Carlsberg this time, for the princely sum of 22 000VND (AUD$1.85, US$1.39) although this is a little expensive for Hanoi, and discover that while the wine glasses displayed on the table are a nice touch, the waiters, like most in beer-loving Hanoi, haven’t realized you can’t pour beer like wine. Craning the neck of the Carlsberg over a glass four feet away on the table is the perfect way to pour a glass of the foamy froth.

The menu (English as well as Vietnamese) is easy to navigate and the food arrives so fast that we barely have time to find the lager in our glasses. Great service but unfortunately a few mix-ups in our ordering. Nem Cua (crab spring rolls) comes out sublimely crisp and golden fried, yet not oily, they are filled with white, succulent crab meat and served with nuoc mam, the ubiquitous fish sauce. Perfection! These go down in the blink of an eye. Next are the Spicy Scallops. Sold by the gram, as is most seafood in Vietnam, we have about ten on the plate, covered in a nice sauce of garlic, ginger, chili and other unidentifiable yet tasty spices. A little heavy on the ginger side and no nem cua, these are nonetheless delish.

The banana flower salad adds a nice contrast to this. Made from the banana flower (obviously) this dish also combines daikon, papaya, bean sprouts, chili and peanuts and is then doused in a good drubbing of dressing made from a base of nuoc mam. This happens to be one of my favourite salads in the world, the best so far having been found at Hoa Sua, so I can be a harsh critic. Unfortunately today’s is not quite as zesty as previous salads but it is still a rocking good salad.

Last but certainly not least comes the tofu and eggplant in tomato sauce. No, this is no Heinz recipe of the week, the tofu and eggplant are cooked in a sauce of tomatoes in a claypot. This was one of the dishes involved in the mix-up and I’m glad we waited. The tofu is golden and firm, the eggplant, melt in your mouth deliciousness, a nice contrast to the seafood and salad. All partnered by wonderfully fluffy rice. Despite the mixups in our order which is a definite down side, this is a great meal, though on the pricey side for Hanoi.

Now I’ll wade into the eternal Hanoi topic of the bathroom. It’s such a regular topic of conversation in fact that I sometimes think there are no others. The toilet at Au Lac house is superb. Like a reverse Alice in Wonderland a rabbit hole door about 12 ft high leads you into a room large enough to be a bedroom. The western style toilet sparkles in a corner and as a nice touch there are fresh roses floating in a deep vase. The Cheshire cat in this analogy would then have to be on the urinal standing proud next to the toilet. In a grinning position atop the structure is a strange electronic gizmo that gender has thwarted my understanding of. I have no idea what it is for, must be a guy thing. Where’s The Whiz when you need it?

Food: Vietnamese

Atmosphere: Calming, aided by the bland, generic jazz, piped through the room. The Girl From Ipanema wandered instrumentally in just before we left and like us was no doubt impressed with the beautiful house and interior with old photographs on the walls.

Drinks: Wine list and all standard alcoholic drinks and juices, soft drinks, tea and coffee. Beers: Heineken, Carlsberg, Hanoi, Tiger (bottle and draught)

The Rundown:
Spicy Scallops, Banana Flower Salad, Crab Spring Rolls, Fried tofu/Eggplant in tomato, Steamed Rice, Soda, Carlsberg (we had 2). Total: 296 000 VND / $24.80 AUD / $18.65 US / $15.40 EURO

Ricebowl rating
4 (one for the spring rolls alone)

Au Lac House
13 Tran Hung Dao Hanoi
Phone 933 3533

Comments

[Tu Cong Van]

Good job mate, i am really enjoying reading your blog. keep updating more.
Love,Tu

[Lisa B]

Hi
Fantastic stuff here. So well done. You should get a government (austrade) grant and publish this as a book.
lb
x

[brighde]

This is just the site I have been looking for...... Being vego limits serverly on food exploration in Vietnam however, this site will certainly help me. Thank you so much.... I agree with above.... Publish this! Have you ever considered doing street food tours for tourists??

[Jens Lund Merrald]

The 25th September my wife and I were guests at your fine restaurant with a Danish group. I have a talk with one of your female servants and then we exchanges e-mail adresses because she was very interested into practis english. I am very sorry, but I did not have her name. I have tried to mail to her, but it dos not work. Could you please say to her, that she could mail to me, at this adress: jens@merrald.dk Thank you.
With kindly regards
Jens Merrald, Denmark

[Ulrich Schmoch]

I visited the Au Lac in October with a fried. We were really exited: excellent Vietnamese food served in an appealing way. You can ask the staff how to eat these dishes in a Vietnamese form. For us, this is the best restaurant that we have seen in Vietnam.

[Takayuki Nakamoto]

I'm Takayuki Nakamoto from Kinden corporation in Japan
We have a reservation on 20th Februally
I'd like you to show me if I can pay by credit card(Visa? American express and so on)

If only cash is acceptable, can I pay by don or US dollar?
I'm looking forward hearing from you

[Roma Nagai]

im mrs. nagai can you show the image of your restaurant inside ,my husband want to confirm the place.