Stickyrice

On Phở, in a Colder Climate

I've strayed from phở in these pages for three years. I'm not sure, however, if it would be possible to stray from it for that long in the streets of Hanoi. Pho's everywhere, still. And I'm still eating it. In the soaking sweat of mid-summer, phở makes me feel cool...once I've stopped eating it. That moment when I down the chopsticks, swipe the flimsy serviette across my perspiring brow and catch the draught of wind from the rotation of the fan; that moment is often the coolest moment of a hot Hanoi summer day, a sensation difficult to communicate.

But it is true that phở captures my imagination moreso in the cooler months of the year. When the sun's warmth is negated by morning mist, when the steam rising from pot and bowl seems more pronounced, when the padded jackets are donned in the year's first cold snap; this is when there is more anticipation, even glee, at the sight of Hanoi phở being set down before me. And when it is from a newly discovered phở vendor, throbbing with a crowd of knowing locals, well...intensify the anticipation by ten.

In the Old Quarter's north, in the nippy shade of the railway viaduct, phở has been reborn to me. To blue formica, set up on both sides of this tradeway leading ulitmately to the Đồng Xuân market, the bowl comes. Big spring onion tadpoles lay on the surface of the broth, over two kinds of beef: slow braised pieces of brisket that lusciously break up when pushed by the tongue to the roof of my mouth and thinly sliced rare steak cooked under the pour of the ladle. A clump of fresh rice noodles sits inert beneath these ingredients and a perfect beef broth, slightly dark but clear.

A Hanoi phở table will not be aggrandized with a garden plate of Saigon herbs and sauces. That would be vulgar, according to the locals. A squeeze of lime and the heat of a chili is bastardization enough. With those, I round out my flavours before freeing my noodles from their knot by lifting and releasing them with my chopsticks a few times.

The anticipation stops. The reality starts. I'm now reassessing my Hanoi phở ratings.

Tuan Ha Phở Bò
34 Hang Giay (Cnr Gam Cau)
Old Quarter, Hanoi

Roaming for Phở

The Spot: I'm cutting a wider arc through Hanoi these days for new phở, venturing into the 'burbs for noodle action, pursuing wide thoroughfares in new residential and commercial precincts to see where most Hanoians are sucking it up. Today I'm on the newish Xa Dan Rd, a km south of championship chicken phở and not far from Hanoi's frequently flooding first road tunnel.

Space and Atmosphere: Functional suburban barn style, fashioned out of corrugated tin on all sides, concrete floor and overhead fans pushing hot air about. Seating for more than a hundred in the barn with potential for fifty more on the very much wider than old quarter footpath outside. In contrast to the simple purpose built design of this establishment are the OTT altars for business prosperity, where more is definitely more. If profit can be measured in ornamentation, in flowers and fruit on an altar, then this phở shop is booming. The proprietress has a smile for the patrons in between pecking bits of corn off a cob and periodically flicking the corners of each bill in her massive cash wad. I'm yet to see a cash register in a phở eatery, except of course for that popular phở franchise.

Shopfront Style: A primary colour contrast of cloudless sky blue against lucky bright Asian red. Pepsi is the preferred cola if you couldn't tell.

Serving Station: This phở house is prepped for an onslaught, all patrons' proclivities for various cuts of chicken meat catered for in trays and containers organized in assembly line manner. Dark flesh, white flesh, skin, organs and large supplies of sliced onion and herbs are laid out around a chopping block formed from a very robust tree trunk. Cleavers, tongs and scissors are the surgical tools needed to tear these birds apart and portion them into bowls.

Sticks, Condiments and Crockery: Classic white seems to be rivalling the old standard China rose bowls with the scalloped rims, these days. Someone's been reading home beautiful magazines. Sticks are straight, washed after use and flung in the sun to dry. I like the little ramekins of salt, fresh chili and lime leaf needles issued on request here. I am very much a fresh chili patron as opposed to a red chili sauce patron. Interestingly, that places me in the minority in the way Vietnamese add their spice at the table.

Meat Generosity: Chicken portions are not dealt daintily here but sometimes I pay for this heavy-handedness at the financial transaction end of proceedings. The conversation may start with the question "why is my bowl more expensive than the last customer's?" and the retort is always "Oh...hahaha...but you had more meat than him'. Say no more!

Service-to-Delivery Gap: We shout the order from the bike parking bay roadside, and by the time helmets are dispensed with and we are positioned on stools out front, the ladle is pouring with steaming broth.

Stock Factor: More sweetness than most chicken phở, putting me in mind of the broths of the south.

Cost: 30,000VND (USD$1.55, AUD$1.60) - a bit over the norm for chicken phở 

Rank: After twenty-seven 'Hanoi Pho Swoop' installments and several posts on pho prior 'the swoop', the ranking palaver is at best like a game of bingo. I would have to go back through the whole archive to do it proper and that's not going to happen. This joint's not bad if you have reason to be in this neighbourhood. Address on signage above.

Pho 112

The Spot: Not far from the 'horrorfare' Kim Ma St, where the road toll is on a giant scoreboard and there is traffic chaos all around. Juxtaposed in a quiet dead-end street (Van Phuc) behind the very secure Japanese Embassy and staff compound in amongst a row of cafes.

Space and Atmosphere: It's a long and narrow space with so many fans, industrial and household, that windy is the prevailing atmosphere - just not sure which direction it's coming from nor how I'll position myself for the eating of the noodles. A bit like the America's Cup! The staff are the most productive I've seen in a pho joint in Hanoi, actually looking for things to do: tables to wipe, bowls to clear, napkins to retrieve from the floor, even smiles to administer to patrons. No slackers or sour-pusses allowed on the payroll. Tables are numbered 1-20. I'm being blown about at table 3. Capacity to seat about 80. Paint is peeling of the walls in a kind of arty-farty abstract way.

Shopfront Style: The 'o' in pho has been fashioned into a steamy soup bowl for signage purposes, where red is the predominant colour. Shop frontage is standard for Hanoi with construction and/or renovation occurring on both sides. The backdrop is a functional Soviet-style apartment block with shonky illegal add-ons showcasing Saturday morning's washing and some dubious plumbing arrangements.

Serving Station: Set out front, up off the pavement, the stand-out features of this operation are the two enormous pots, big enough to simmer small children in. It's a logical assembly line starting inside with the dunking and separating of noodles, the portioning of bird flesh and herbs and then the flourish of the ladle in the sunlight at the end.

Sticks, Condiments and Crockery: My overwhelmingly favourite item on the table are the plastic spoons in the red sauce and garlic infused vinegar, like cocktail stirrers but with handles which terminate in the heads of cartoon pigs. Bowls are plain white, sticks straight, eating ends clearly denoted.

Meat Generosity: Large thick slices of countryside bird (ga ta) are plentiful on the surface and below. This place is used to foreigners: not a hint of skin, gristle, cartilage, bone nor beak or comb in my bowl.

Service to Delivery Gap: As 9am is like midday in Vietnam, the breakfast rush is well and truly over and the bowl is delivered pronto with a smile, by a boy wearing a black T-shirt coloured with androgynous Chinese pop-stars.

Stock Factor: The flavour is testament to the serious two-pot process going on out front. Tasty.

Cost: 18,000VND (USD94c, AUD$1.10)

Rank: I would like to remove this category from the Hanoi Pho Swoop...over time, the judge has been corrupted!

Pho Installment No 25

The Spot: 36 Hang Da Street, between Hang Bong Street and what was the Hang Da Market, in amongst a range of clothes boutiques and jewellery shops, in the vicinity of most famous bun bo nam bo. This pho establishment has gone completely unnoticed. Until now.

Space and Atmosphere: The premises are long and deep, characteristics common of old quarter houses, which are referred to in some literature as 'tube houses'. The front room has walls lined, to about shoulder height, with white bathroom tiles edged at the top with green, presumably for ease of wiping, should any soup or chili sauce go astray. Other elements of the decor are purely functional, too: a clock tells the time, an agricultural pesticide company calendar tells the date, a grime coated TV screen up high tries to broadcast a picture and the business altar brings business.

Shopfront Style: From across the street, I see elements of art-deco in the second storey of the building, with the historic Hue name,Phu Xuan, painted white, standing out in brown render work. The downstairs is not in keeping with the upstairs. Here, business is done, income generated and style gives way again to function.

Serving Station: On a large table, glass cabinets are arranged like building blocks, some containing bowls, others various ingredients and utensils. A chopping block is used to flatten raw beef (tai) and (health inspectors of the west, close your eyes) to slice cooked beef (chin). Soup pots are clumped by the pavement. On the personnel front, sisters are doin' it for themselves here. A young boy, presumably one of their sons, attempted to open the fridge door and was admonished and swiftly sent from whence he came.

Sticks, Condiments and Crockery: Big white bowls for soup, medium white bowls for lime wedges, small white bowls for fresh chili. Red sauce, vinegar and fish sauce come in recycled plastic bottles, crude holes punched in their caps. Standard bamboo sticks, relatively easy to match in length, width and bias.

Meat Generosity: A fistful from the sister with the big hand

Service to Delivery Gap: Given that it seemed to be family hour, with kids making various demands of their parents, who in turn made them of the staff - for no onions, nothing green, no meat - I count my blessings that I have my soup in five minutes.

Stock Factor: Dark and robust, salty but tasty.

Cost: Pho Tai is 20,000VND (USD$1.05, AUD$1.25), Pho Tai Chin is 25,000VND

Rank: Fair to middling.

Real Chicken Pho

The Spot: A prominent corner of one of the Old Quarter's busier intersections where the traffic lights have been permanently switched off! Buses power through here, horns blasting. An antique fan repair shop is opposite, a temple of primary colours adjacent behind. Just up the street from "most famous" pho, at 1 Hang Dieu.

Space and Atmosphere: The cluttered interior is strangely triangular in shape, a pokey hole which can accommodate ten to twelve noodle-munchers, all elbows in! The major space is curbside where perhaps twenty patrons can sit. The pervading ambience is raw traffic chaos. Get ready to run from any rogue moto careening out of the path of a reckless bus driver.

Shopfront Style: A spidery shade-casting banyan dominates the shopfront. Erupting out of the concrete footpath, its hanging roots have been clipped, its branches claw at the power lines and scratch at the eatery's red signage.

Serving Station: A glass cabinet contains a bounty of assorted chicken bits. Dark meat, white meat, chewy sinewy bits, threads of boiled skin like bumpy rubber bands. The woman seated behind it is chief portioner, swivelling from side to side, dunking and separating noodles, pinching and arranging chook and spring onions, ladling soup. Crouched behind her is another woman, an expert in chicken anatomy, who cleavers at the birds, digging out every last edible shred of flesh from each carcass.

Sticks, Condiments and Crockery: The varnish is chipping off the sticks. Plastic plates of lime wedges and a stunning palette of fiery chilis and pin thin lime leaf strips make for a colourful table. It's comforting that the bowls are the usual floral numbers scalloped just above the base, just like Nana's.

Meat Generosity: Plenty of the sort I'm not all that fond of - chewy, attached to skin and favoured vehemently by the locals. I'm such a fussy ponce in this matter!

Service to Delivery Gap: A very popular joint, they shunt the punters in and out to maximise seat turnover. I drew breath a dozen times and the pho was before me.

Stock Factor: Slightly cloudy and not as comforting as I remembered from a previous visit.

Cost: 20,000VND (USD$1.05, AUD$1.15)

Rank: Not up there.

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!

Good Bird Soup

 

The Spot: North-west of the Old Quarter, within spitting distance of Truc Bach Lake and just up from the Chau Long market, this fine exponent of bird soup is directly opposite the Hanoi Cooking Centre (which incidentally had its official launch late last week). One of my favourite coffee hangouts is nearby...in fact so near I wheel my motorbike there afterwards. Nothing quite like good pho followed immediately after by an hour on the caffeine drip!

Space and Atmosphere: A jolly owner directs patrons to appropriate parking spots and collects the dong on the way out. He attempted a conversation in English with me, and despite his abstract pronunciation, I manage to gain full comprehension. Amazing what seven years in a classroom with Vietnamese students can do! The pho chain gang are ready at the serving station of this narrow space, which has walls papered with fantastic metallic floral contact. I think my textbooks were covered with the stuff in the 70's. Dusty plastic flower arrangements feature prominently and every unopened soft drink, beer and Hanoi vodka bottle is shelved against the floral walls, giving off some kind of trippy psychedelic vibe. The business altar above the back door is flashing with fairy lights.

Shopfront Style: Mixed messages are being conveyed here. Up high, there is pepsi sponsored signage promoting pho ga at a completely different address while below, the shop's yellow canopy advertises che, which they apparently flog at night. The latter has the correct address. Ignore the signs and look for the chickens!

 

Sticks, Condiments and Crockery: The chopsticks are shorter and with a more defined eating end than the industry standard sticks found in most pho joints. Old jam jars do nicely for the red sauce and garlic infused vinegar while the lime wedges are fully replenished on fancy orange tear-shaped plates. All in all things are spiffy in the condiments department, with smudges and smears kept to a minimum. A clean-freak is in the house somewhere!

Serving Station: A chopping block, various plastic containers of seasoning, mi chinh, lime leaf needles and stainless steel bowls and trays loaded up with bird bits for all tastes as well as plates of rare and corned beef for the pho purists...the big custom-made glass and steel cabinet is well set up for pho assembly, with the finishing touches of herbs and soup carried out by the ladler on the street.

Meat Generosity: A generous handful of quality bird from the thigh and breast lands in my bowl along with a serving of trang trung (tubes and eggs).

Service to Delivery Gap: I hit this bird soup house during a lull, so after putting in my order on the way in, the soup practically followed me to the table.

Stock Factor: I slurped to almost the bottom of the bowl.

Cost: All spelled out in the photo above. (USD$1.40, AUD$1.72)

Rank: I can't bring myself to start the ranking palaver again, by setting pho in conflict with pho, chicken pho against beef pho in an unresolvable battle that will only end in tears. Nor do I want to be exposed for my less than scientific research methods. Let me just rate this as pretty bloody good!

Let's not forget pho

An acquiantance of mine is leaving Hanoi after three years. Last week at a farewell lunch, we got to talking about food. It was me who guided the conversation there as I'm fairly shallow on other topics. I'm always intrigued by how little exposure some medium-to-long-term ex-pats have had to street food. I wanted to interrogate the acquaintance, see what her form was like.

Not that this is how I judge people, of course.

I try not to, anyway. But I got the sense that the acquaintance's excitement about Vietnamese cuisine and the local specialties was limited to her first year here. She claimed to have overdosed on pho, admitting to knocking off three bowls a day on occasion, one for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The acquaintance was fast becoming a friend, or at the very least an inspiration for a future post. Even I have not attempted this 'pho three-peat feat'.

While the acquaintance lost her pho mojo early on, citing some kind of MSG giddiness, I have soldiered on. I may not have written about it for a year or more but be assured that noodle soup is still slurped and sipped regularly at stickyrice HQ. I still revere the pho ritual. I feel excited when waiting for my bowl to arrive, chopsticks cursorily cleaned with paper and ready. Juice is extracted from a wedge of lime. Hot red sauce is passed over in favour of a few slices of fresh chili. A drop of garlic-infused vinegar, a shake of pepper. The ceremonial lifting and dropping of the noodles with the sticks and spoon to mix the condiments in signals that the preparation is done. Afterwards, I wipe my mouth with a square of flimsy napkin and insert the toothpick.

And I feel as if I should genuflect as I back out onto the street.

Is there a need to resurrect the Hanoi Pho Swoop, to revise it with a chapter or two, to suck up new noodles and spit out new words?

I wonder.

Orange Pho 24 Imposter

The Spot: Not far from the main railway station, just off Le Duan at the western end of Nguyen Du (108), this modern pho establishment is a fine example of a trend I blogged about a little while ago. Dubbed 'Pho Quen' (not Queen), it's directly next door to a probable Polo Ralph Lauren imposter outlet, with the other main businesses in this street dealing in fire extinguishers and safety helmets.

Space and Atmosphere: Go upstairs to a mezzanine level or around behind the shiny new cash register (cash register, in a Hanoi pho house??...what happened to the old tea tin, or grubby cash-laden hanky tucked into ma's knickers???) and drinks bar to half a dozen or so tables on the ground floor. Be careful to dodge the fancily attired staff who are tripping over each other to be of assistance in that cheesy 'franchisy' way. I justed wanted to slap them.

Shopfront Style: A direct rip-off of Pho 24, except orange, right down to the flashing neon arrow pointing customers inside.

Sticks, Condiments and Crockery: Clear, logo-stamped perspex boxes house the black plastic sticks and silver spoons, which have clearly been organized by someone with OCD. Symmetrical and spotless, they augment more clear vessels containing red sauce, chili-infused oil and garlic vinegar. A rather poor imitation of Pho 24's side plate of herbs, bean shoots, lime wedges and fresh chili arrives along with the paper placemats espousing this joint's flowery-worded philosophy. If I translated it, you'd vomit!

Serving Station: A glass walled booth left of the entrance, with a serving window where the noodles are dispensed to the waiting staff. Marble benchtops, plastic gloves and tupperware containers abound, the chefs look the part in starched white and there is no evidence of animal carcass or organ visible to the eye. This is doctor's clinic pho, portioned with precision, lacking feel.

Meat Generosity: The scales ensure that all customers receive one of their daily recommended meat allotments - no more, no less!

Service to Delivery Gap: With staff out-numbering customers, there was no problem in this regard.

Stock Factor: Slightly murky but tasty enough.

Cost: I'm paying for the salubrious (and orange!) surroundings here. Well over the industry average, in the 20,000s.

Rank: I'm loath to continue the ranking system, other than to say this bowl of noodles is nothing special.

Belated Seasons Greetings! I've been in Oz, pouring loads of wine down my throat and over-indulging in foods not freely available in the Hanoi streets! Hope the coming year is kind.

Hanoi Pho Swoop Top 20

I've sucked them up all over town. Up alleys, down lanes, in gutters, next to churches, with exhaust fumes puffing in my face, with a grandad coughing his last bark in a bed right next to me. Pho knows no boundaries in Hanoi. Morning, noon and night, these noodles are slurped as a snack, a meal, a cure for a cold, a chill or a hangover.

Almost 18 months ago, I began crapping on in public about Hanoi's signature dish on this blog by way of the Hanoi Pho Swoop. There was talk of some mythical scrap of paper known to some as the Hanoi Pho Map. It hasn't materialised. I've abandoned that search. Its urban legend status remains unchanged.

Do not despair, however, as I have solid findings about pho, not on a map per se but found easily enough on the back of any xe om worth his ounce of street cred.

I present to you, dear readers.....

THE STICKYRICE 'HANOI PHO SWOOP' TOP TWENTY SLURPS
(as at 26/11/07)

1. Best Pho Ga By Far So Far (posted 26/7/06)
    "Get me a whole bird in my soup!"

2. Would You Queue For Pho (2/8/06)
    "...a joint that Hanoians spruik up as one of the places to slurp one's noodles"

3. Pho Corner (12/9/06)
    "...cleavered chicken pieces, diced up hearts and livers, sliced fillets of breast covered in lime leaf needles, a huge pile of fresh pho, a pot, a sieve, a ladle and some bowls"

4. Thick Pho (4/12/06)
    "...extra thick noodle straps...add an indefinable dimension here"

5. Clean Stern Pho (3/9/07)
    "all of the Hanoi standards are rigidly adhered to: floral bowls, tick; bamboo sticks, tick; red sauce in plastic cups, tick; lime wedges, tick; refuse underfoot, tick!"

6. Pho Franchise (9/11/06)
    "classy almost minimalist, a far cry from the cluttered detritus of the average family pho show in Hanoi"

7. Old Quarter Market Pho Ga (13/8/07)
    "...plenty going in to each bowl here, birdwise and otherwise"

8. Major Pho Stop (10/2/07)
    "Three white-coated pho maids head up this operation"

9. Up Market Pho (7/10/06)
    "...no slap dash affair. Someone cares"

10. Crabby Faced Pho (29/7/07)
      "Retro-post-war-functional and communist"

11. Pho Map Installment No.15 (16/4/07)
      "Fine cow indeed!"

12. Stumbled Upon Pho (11/7/07)
      "...all deafening shout and bang here"

13. Pho Ga Blur (8/8/06)
      "...this rambling kerbside affair is an evening only slurp in a dark section of the old quarter"

14. Religious Pho (13/3/07)
      "... a drop of it might have descended from the original Hanoi pho pot from a century or so ago"

15. Pho Poser (10/7/06)
      "...there's half a cow on board this bowl"

16. Market Street Pho Ga (21/1/07)
      "... a space no bigger than a prison cell, lit similarly with bright fluorescent light"

17. Pho Map Installment No.16 (25/6/07)
      "Steaming and robust, shiny yellow oil pills dotting the surface"

18. Friendly Grotbox (17/11/06)
      "...bargain basement territory..."

19. More Pho Tails (20/8/06)
      "... a definitive little pinch me moment of "bloody hell, I live in Vietnam"

20. Pho Map Installment No.2 (18/8/06)
      "...chewy, fatty and if I think too hard I might be forced to spit it into a serviette"