More words and pictures on southern tucker. Bun ca is a fish noodle soup purveyed all over the country in all manner of ways. Most versions have two fishy characters, a fried mystery cakey number and filleted chunks of a firm white swimmer, sometimes steamed, sometimes fried.
I prefer my fish on the coast. This is Nha Trang bun ca. The fish in these bowls had been slipping along in the currents of the South China Sea only a matter of hours before. I'd been in the sack dreaming up the day's eating itinerary, trying to will this particular soup cave open, after having been tortured by their closure for two days. Having a holiday on my holiday, the selfish loafers had been!
The fortune-teller must have deemed day three of the year of the dog as the most auspicious for re-opening a fish business. Now, thanks be to the numbers or the tea-leaves, I was in business too! The fishy soupy brekky was brought on. It was as I remembered it from the previous year, the pre-sticky period, when all I had to do was shovel it into the eating hole.
This day of the bun ca resurrection, the dutiful pencil wrote down the fish's name (ca ngu, a tuna), something about clear, clean-flavoured broth and then grew jealous of the chopsticks and withdrew. In its place, the camera shot the condiment portrait below and the soupscape above, before it too was rendered redundant.
The writer was experiencing some kind of frenzied, divine eating intervention, not quite talking in tongues but raving an order for a second bowl, mesmerised by the flame of the chili and confused about whether he was in heaven or hell.
Later, with belly full and catharsis complete, he ambled up the coast, took in a scene and attempted recuperation, before the hours ticked down to lunchtime.
It was heaven....
The Small Sacrifice
Two bowls of fish noodle soup - 20,000VND (USD$1.25, AUD$1.70)
Bun Ca
Pham Boi Chau St
Nha Trang (near the main market)
Awww... I miss Nhatrang already. I'll come back to Nhatrang this summer. I *love* bun ca. Trust me... last time when I was in Nhatrang, i ate 5 or 6 bows. for some reasons (yeah... like i know) bows in VN are relatively small compare to that in the U.S. When I finished my dinner a stack of bows placed on the table next to me!!! Everybody just looked at me and wonder if i was just escaping from jail or a desterted island or something. Or maybe they just wonder if i could just "eat and run".
Doug
Posted by: Doug | 13 March 2006 at 12:42 PM
Doug - you put me to shame! I give in!
Posted by: Sticky | 13 March 2006 at 10:13 PM