One of the famous local dishes in Hanoi is Cha Ca, which is a fish that is de-boned, spiced, wrapped in banana leaves and cooked over coals. It's served with noodles, peanuts, spice veggies and fish sauce. Tash and I found Cha Ca Zhang Long, a restaurant that had one thing on its menu: Cha Ca. We figured this was the best place to try it! After walking for over 40 minutes (this was another time in Hanoi that our map failed us) we finally found the restaurant, however they said they weren't open for another 2 hours. What? We popped in a hostel across the street to ask for another local recommendation, and when we came out we saw that there were patrons in Cha Ca Zhang Long. We went back and the owner said he'd open early since so many of us wanted to eat there. Yessss! We cooked the fish in a pan at our table and added the spices as we ate- it was definitely interesting!
Another thing Tash and I had to try while we were in Hanoi was the local street food. There's plenty of street food in Thailand, however when you sit at a stall to eat you're sitting at tables that are "normal" sized. In Vietnam, miniature sized tables and chairs are squished together on the sidewalks, so that people are only a foot and a half to two feet off the ground while they eat. The food was delicious and the company was interesting. I couldn't help but stare when the girls next to us ordered chicken feet for dinner!
What goes better with local food than local beer? Tash and I had to try the bia hanoi, which tastes exactly like any other light beer in SE Asia-- that's to say, nothing special.
The best though was probably when we stopped at a late night food stall for lebanese food. Again we were sitting at miniature tables on the sidewalk. Tash and I ordered hummus and when it arrived that's all it was- hummus- there weren't veggies, or pita bread, or any dippers whatsoever. When we questioned the owner, he smirked and offered us a spoon. Was this really how lebanese people ate their hummus? Tash and I were not sold. What made matters worse? Tash headed to the bathroom to discover that the only sink in the entire joint was in the bathroom-- the restaurant dishes were stacked on the bathroom floor, waiting to be cleaned. And the clean ones were...? In a different stack on the floor?
Meh. Maybe we didn't want that hummus after all.
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