Vietnamese food is versatile and delicious. As well as popular dishes like bánh mì and phở, we tried many foods there.

A bánh mì is a traditional Vietnamese food, usually a bread roll with vegetables, meat, and sauces inside. In Hanoi, the local kind of bánh mì is Hanoi style, with subtle flavours, airy bread rolls and minimal fillings. The most common type internationally is the Saigon style, which has much more bold flavours. We had lots of bánh mìs in our time in Hanoi, and we liked the way the bread was fluffy and fresher than others we’ve tried. As you can see below, Esti also enjoyed this particular dish!

We also had a lot of phở in Hanoi, which was clear with simple toppings, and usually served in the mornings for breakfast or lunch. The flavour of the soup was always very tasty, and thankfully for M, there were lots of chicken soup noodles, not just beef ones that make up the majority of phởs in Australia.

More food found in Hanoi includes roast pork, which includes the fat – it’s considered lucky – and has lots of flavour, but is expensive as it is considered a fancy dish. There are also a few types of noodles there, including a common street food called bun cha, a savoury platter that N had a few times in Vietnam. It’s a dish consisting of noodles, meat and herbs, and a tasty sauce to give the noodles flavour.

The drinks in Vietnam are just as creative and unique. There are many types of coffee we tried, like coconut coffee, egg coffee, and salt coffee.

The salt coffee is sweet as well as salty, with condensed milk and salt foam. The salt cuts out the bitterness of the coffee as well as the sweetened condensed milk.

Coconut coffee is often served cold, but can be drunk hot too. The idea is similar to salt coffee, with sweetened condensed milk layered in it and added coconut cream for the sweet coconut flavour.

Egg coffee combines foam from egg yolk, sugar, and sweetened condensed milk, and was created during a shortage of milk during the French War. However, egg coffee doesn’t taste like eggs; the yolk turns into a cream compared to custard and is still a common type of coffee.

M’s favourite of these was the salt one, but the overall Vietnamese take on coffee is a unique and sweet style.

Food and drinks that are uncommon in Australia where everywhere in Vietnam, like green mangoes and kumquat tea.

While there are many tasty traditional foods in Vietnam, the place is also home to unorthodox food and drink too.