profoundfluxpudding

When I start talking about something I want to do, I can’t rest until I’ve done it. I so hate when people are ATNA (all talk no action) that I will do anything to avoid this. Often, this means that I do things too quickly and don’t plan thoroughly. But sometimes it works out.

I’ve been talking about buying a blender for a week or so now. I’ve started dreaming up smoothie concoctions – banana, mango, and soymilk or passionfruit, banana, and yogurt. Maybe I can use cucumbers for something. Or avocado. Does mangosteen work for smoothies?

I haven’t been this into smoothies since middle school when they came out as a hot new fad. But I’ve been searching for a breakfast routine here quite unsuccessfully. I went through a phase of eating pho, of making oatmeal in a rice cooker, and of eating yogurt with homemade granola. But I’m so fickle lately. Now the idea of smoothies has captivated my every cell.

Finally, on my way home today, I stopped at an electronics store on electronics street. I instantly fell in love with a retro green blender. It costs 650,000VND, the lady at the store told me.

Shoot, I only had 550,000 VND in my wallet. I showed her my empty wallet. I knew this meant that I would just have to come back another day and buy my blender. But I was CRUSHED.

She showed me a different blender that cost 550,000VND. It was white and boring – nothing like the cute green blender that reminded me of the Kitchenaid products I’ve always coveted. “I don’t like this one,” I said.

“Hold on one minute,” she told me. She went to confer with someone else. Then the miraculous happened – she told me I could have the green blender for 550,000VND.

It wasn’t even that I had set out to bargain. Had I had the extra 100,000VND (all of US$5) in my wallet, I would have paid the amount she told me and thought nothing of it. But my inadvertent bargaining strategy had worked – probably because I was totally sincere and they felt sorry for the girl who was about to spend all her money so that she could make breakfast smoothies.

Anyways, it felt good to be on the right side of a rip-off. Maybe now that my 1 year anniversary in Vietnam is coming up, I am finally starting to get it.

And now I will dream of smoothies.

“Is this going to be a quixotic quest?” I asked Sarah, my housemate who has accompanied me on many a misadventure. “No, I think we will find it,” she assured me.

Both of us had been yearning to try hot ginger che after reading about it in the January issue of The Word. However,  we had never really figured out where it was or how to order it before the weather got too hot.

This week has been cold  (I turned my space heater on and pulled out my wool coat again) so the craving to try the hot delicacy came back. We were at lunch and wishing we knew what street in the Old Quarter it was on and what is was called. Luckily, our friend Jonathan was at lunch with us. He showed us the street on a map and wrote down the name for us – banh troi nong.

I had been on a mission to find this elusive dessert since January and now my dream was finally coming true! Sarah and I found the spot  (76 Hang Dieu)and ordered  with no problem. Within seconds of sitting down, a lady brought us two small bowls of hot ginger soup with sesame seeds, peanuts, and rice dumplings, and coconut. It was everything I had hoped it would be.

When I first arrived in Vietnam, I tried che and immediately dismissed it as something I had no interest in. It was like a fruit tart for me – yummy, but not ice cream or chocolate so not worth it. Why would I want to eat beans, potatoes, corn, or lotus seeds if I was eating dessert?

However, I am starting to get more into che – the sweet dessert soups. It can be served warm when the weather is cold and with ice as a refreshing treat when its hot. There are so many different types, colors, and variations that finding the best concoction becomes an adventure.

Also, I love discovering new street food. I decided that going to only  upscale restaurants depresses me. I feel so removed from my surroundings. I am much happier when I am connecting with the city and the people on the street at pho shops or tea stalls. And now che stores.  Holy hot ginger!

New pho is almost as oxymoronic as old news. There are pho shops sprinkled all over Hanoi and to the untrained eye, they are pretty much identical. Some offer chicken or beef and other just one or the other. Most offer pho xao and ap chao as well. All should have a container for chopsticks, napkins, and spoons that sits a top a metal or plastic table. There is always a spicy red condiment jar, a clear garlicky condiment jar, limes, and slice of hot pepper.

Still, I was curious when I saw a sign for a grand opening of a pho shop near my office and had to check it out. It said it was pho Nam Dinh, the province that pho originated in. According to an article about pho in the Voice of Vietnam, villagers from Nam Dinh came to Hanoi to sell pho because there was more of a demand in the city. As the owner of Pho Lanh on Nui Truc says, “Although the dish originated in our village it was unable to fully develop there because the people had very low incomes; there wasn’t a high demand for this type of food, which was relatively expensive. Consequently, many of us have had to set up businesses outside of our homeland.”

While even the founder of Hanoi Cooking Centre Tracey Lister believes that pho originated in Nam Dinh, ambiguity remains over the origin of this quintessential Vietnamese dish. Some say its a combination of Chinese and French influences – the rice noodles coming from China and the beef coming from France. Others refuse to attribute any influence to these invading forces and claim that pho is purely Vietnamese.

Some of the original Nam Dinh pho shops remain popular in Hanoi and I am now on a mission to seek these out and see if I can tell a difference. I am not sure if the pho Nam Dinh that just opened at 12 Van Phuc is real or a copycat (welcome to Vietnam, the country of copycats). Also,  I like to order ap chao because it had more greens, tomato, and garlic, but ap chao is not as traditional. In fact, as I was eating a bowl of it last week, some awkward Vietnamese guy decided to join me and chat. He told me that if I liked ap chao, it meant I had very modern tastes (Hanoians seem to like their food boring and same same). At first I was entertained by his presence, but then he tried to get me to go to a cafe or bia hoi with him and asked for my number. I was not interested so I quickly slurped my noodles and ran off down the street.

In addition to the new pho place on my street, a Pho 24 just opened near my house. According to the “Pho” Nam Dinh article, this chain is a threat to the traditional pho shops. I think it is a sign of development and a country in flux (for better and worse). I like to eat pho on the street and dislike the fact that little shops are being threatened by mammoth chains with special deals and combo meals. The pho 24 even has WIFI. The idea of advertising for WIFI at a pho shop is a perfect example of how Hanoi is changing and trying to balance age-old tastes with new-age technology.

I try to keep my pho real. I don’t want faux Louis Vuitton and I don’t want faux pho.

Update: It seems that I am not the only one that can write endlessly about pho. Food writer Mimi Sheraton also found the simultaneously simple and complex soup to be noteworthy. Read her article in the Smithsonian Magazine (March 2010 issue).

Whenever I decide to cook in Hanoi, I almost always make Mexican-inspired food. I have hosted countless quesadilla/rice&beans nights.

Part of the reason is that Mexican food is simply my favorite (tortilla soup might as well be my religion) and it is hard to find any decent Mexican food here…. the pho you can find in Fresno is way better than the tacos you can find in Hanoi. There is one place called Cafe 129 that actually has some decent Mexican inspirations (either that or my sense of Mexican food has gone as awry as my sense of fashion since living here). At Cafe 129, there are three Mexican items on the menu: fajitas, taco, and burrito. The funny thing is that the fajitas come wrapped up like a taco!

Another reason why I love to cook Mexican food in Hanoi is that most of the key ingredients are readily available. I have to go to a speciality grocery store for cheese and tortillas, but I can find almost everything else in the small market in my alley: cilantro, lime, spicy peppers, pepper, garlic, rice,tomato, onion, and avocado. One time I ate guacamole with shrimp crackers and had an epiphany for creating a Vietnamese-Mexican fusion Restaurant. I typically like things that are genuine and fusions always seem awkwardly forced, but I think this could be a lot of fun:

• guacamole spring rolls
• tortilla soup pho
• spring rolls taquitos
• rice paper burrito
• bun dau with salsa
• bun cha with cheese
• rice and beans with fish sauce

Ok so maybe I still need to do some experimenting, but I think this would be a perfect restaurant to open in California! As soon as its avocado season, I am going to get to work on this plan. Oh, and perhaps I should take a few more Vietnamese cooking classes in the mean time…

And the name of my restaurant would be Profound Vexed Pudding (Vexed  = confused Vietnamese Mexican).

This week I invented quinoa burritos. It did not have any Vietnamese flavors, but it was a delicious gluten free vegan meal.

Recipe (with no measurements because I don’t have any measuring tools in my kitchen)

1. cook about 3/4 c quinoa in a rice cooker
2. saute onion, then add red pepper until cooked. Add in canned corn, canned kidney beans, cilantro, and cooked quinoa. Flavor with turmeric, salt, pepper, and hot sauce.
3. wrap quinoa mix in a corn tortilla with lettuce.
4. Add more hot sauce. Enjoy!

I wrote the request for a cooking class on Friday afternoon and on Saturday morning, Nam arrived with the ingredients for our meal. I wanted to make typical Vietnamese food. Together we decided on tofu stuffed with pork in tomatoes, nem (fried pork spring rolls), salad, and soup.

We had to start at 10 AM to have our feast ready for lunch. The morning came early and the four of us cooking students arrived to the kitchen a bit tired and frazzled. However, once we got the coffee rolling and the music blasting, we were ready to go.

Nam was really entertaining. His favorite actress is Sandra Bullock and his favorite movie was Miss Congeniality. However, he also knew what he was doing and was able to manage the four of us – even as we could not do the things he does in his sleep, like flip fried tofu, cut carrots into flowers, and slice tiny peppers so that they can blossom in water and turn into a garnish.

We tried to keep up with him by scribbling down ingredients and recipes. He was conducting us with the ease of a maestro.  I think we would all agree that making nem was the best part – mixing pork, onion, dried mushrooms, mien noodles, and egg into a batter that is that spooned into rice paper, rolled up carefully and fried (Needless to say, we had some rolling and frying mishaps).

I plan to recreate the fried tofu in tomatoes, but would probably leave out the pork stuffing.  The soup was only so so, the fish sauce/sugar/MSG dressing made the salad tasty, and the morning glory with garlic was yummy, but nothing special.

I loved the way Nam had all these little tricks – like squishing garlic with a spoon and using chopsticks to test if the oil was hot enough for frying. He had tricks up his sleeves, but I learned to real secret to Vietnamese cooking was MSG. I always suspected it was in my food, but did not realize the extent of its prevalence until he made us go to the market to buy a “seasoning pack.” He made us taste everything before declaring that it needed more “seasoning,” the innocent euphemism for MSG.

The final product – note the garnishes

So I have been wanting to take a cooking class the entire time I have lived in Vietnam. I am not the only one who gets inspired by the local flavors and markets because there are lots and lots of cooking classes offered. I have held off on one of the $40 half-day cooking classes because they seemed touristy and I thought that there just MUST be a better way to learn how to cook Vietnamese food. I knew I just needed to find a nice Vietnamese mom or someone who liked to cook but I was not sure how to go about it. I almost caved and paid for a touristy class with a few friends for tomorrow morning.

Then I had an epiphany – DUH – I could post a classified on the The New Hanoian (our Yelp and Craigslist combined). I posted this message:

Within two hours, I had three responses. One from a woman who cooked for an expat family and wanted more hours and another from a 23 year old student/English teacher who had taken culinary courses and cooked for his family since he was in 9th grade. The boy sent me this message:

Hi Juliap,

I’ve just read your posting and I think it accord with me.

My name is Nam, 23 years old.I started cooking for my family since i

was a student in grade 9 till now.

About the cooking level, I have joined in an extra-class on culinary

in the last summer. after the course I am quite confident with my

cooking ability. I am doing well with daily dishes and various special

dishes for every festive occasions in a years.

The cooking course that i mentioned above has tremendously strengthen

my interest in gastronomy. And sharing skills is one of my hobbies.

By the way, I am a Vietnamese language tutor, I can teach you if you

like. And ready for the lesson tomorrow morning.

I met with the woman first – she was nice and said that I could text her what I wanted to learn how to cook and she would bring over the ingredients for just 200,000 VND. I told her I would let her know about tomorrow because I totally fell for Nam after his cute message.  Name seemed like a lot of fun. We decided that he would bring over supplies to cook a salad, nem, and soup tomorrow at 10 AM so that the food can be ready for lunch.

This could be really interesting or a total disaster. If it is a disaster, it will still be fun because I am doing the class with three of my best friends here. And, I will at least know I tried to keep it local. It is waay less expensive and I feel better giving money to a cook or a student than some touristy restaurant!

PS – my ID name on The New Hanoian is juliap. Nam thinks my name is Juliap and said, “hello juliap!” when I met him at my house. Of course I decided not to correct him….