Off the Map

Seafood/Snail: Oc 是福寿螺，小心吃

1. Oc Vi Saigon (map) – Michelin recommended, tried twice without diarrhea, has clean indoor seating but low chairs. Our most favorite was the salty egg yolk snail, there’s so much salty egg yolk as if it’s free.. Vietnamese may also improve the baguette? It’s soft, puffy and warm when served, and dipping them in the salty egg yolk tastes like heaven!
2. Oc Nong Ha Trang (map) – haven’t tried but full of locals eating on low stools on the streets

Beef pho/Pho bo 牛肉粿条

1. Phở Sướng (map) – I love the brisket pho (chin gau-nam) the most!
2. Pho 10 Ly Quoc Su (map) – Michelin star, long line everyday
3. Phở bò Khôi Hói (map) – haven’t tried but also full of locals on the streets!

Chicken pho/Pho ga 鸡肉粿条

1. Phở Hạnh (map) – dry pho, attracted by locals eating on the streets the first night in Hanoi, then I usually most locals eat on street stalls lol. They even take up the space across the street in front of a pharmacy, which I thought was the restaurant name at first ha!
2. Phở Gà Nguyệt (map) – has both dry (phở trộn) and soupy (phở nước) pho, and can select different chicken cuts. I think chicken wing is the best (60k dong or $2.4)!

Bun rieu 蟹粉面

1. Bún riêu Cô Hoàn Hàng Lược (map) – recommended by xiaohongshu and hotel CRM, environment is not as clean, staff was not very friendly either – first kept tapping me to order in a rude way, then charged me 20k extra as she said I ordered both mantis shrimp and beef (which I didn’t), but they ran out of beef so she doubled my mantis shrimp. Either I was annoyed by their attitude and being treated differently, or I didn’t think their bun rieu was that good, I have removed this bookmark

Bánh Cuốn 肠粉

1. Bánh Cuốn Gia Truyền Thanh Vân (map) – Bánh Cuốn is basically rice roll, much thinner than the Cantonese one. Also it uses pork/chicken + wooden ear as filling, dipping in waterbug sauce (tastes weird by itself but brings out the flavor of Bánh Cuốn very nicely!!)

Cháo Lòng 猪杂粥

1. Cháo Lòng Cháo Lòng (map) – Cháo Lòng is pork offal congee, with a variety of organs such as large intestine stuffed with pork blood, small intestine, liver, stomach, etc. I only had it at this place but I think it has a bit MSG? There’s also seasoned raw pig blood soup

Bún ngan 鸭汤粉

1. Bún Miến Ngan Minh Thu (map) – noodle soup with mule duck, mule duck, rice vermicelli, fresh bamboo shoots soup with pork blood. Duck here was meh, we were given the not-so-good part near the butt, but the bamboo shoot soup with pork blood is pretty good esp with chili! Sour but well balanced

Cafe

1. C.O.C Legacy Specialty Coffee (map) – it’s hidden on 2nd floor after a super narrow, down, swirly staircase of a building in one of the busiest street of Old Quarter. It could take quite some time to get the coffee, but I think their egg cream is the richest, does not have the raw egg taste; salty cream is smooth and they provide taro chips
   • I found the book “Hanoi the Lifestyle and the Food” by Ngoc Tran at C.O.C on my first day in Hanoi. It not only has photograph of Hanoi, recipe of Viet food, but also detailed relevant cultures. For the next few days, I had been searching for this book in various bookstores, but most didn’t have a good selection of English titles. The few that did often marked up prices two to three times the original price, covering the original tag with stickers. None of them had the book I wanted.
   • We returned to C.O.C and asked twice if we could buy the used copy of the book, but the answer was no. We then considered reaching out to family members traveling to Ho Chi Minh City (HCM) to see if they could help, but the chances seemed slim. Eventually, I discovered that new copies of the book were available in HCM and could be delivered for just 25k.
   • We proposed to the C.O.C owner that we buy the used book and arrange for a new one to be delivered to their store, but they declined again. After several rounds of back-and-forth negotiations, I finally managed to get the book from them—at the original price, without any delivery charges!
2. Hidden Gem (map) – We had our coffee making class here, but overall I think the drinks were mediocre? A bit too sweet. However, the owner has designed the space of 4 floor smartly, made you feel like you are truly in a hidden gem. Murals of Hanoi street scenes of a variety of people, chairs made from basket, light cover made from water bottle, decors made of beer, liquor bottles, and a food elevator. Worth just hanging out there with friends and admire this place!
3. Cafe Giang – Richest egg cream of all egg coffee we had so far, just a bit of coffee. Also offers egg rum and other egg beverages. Worth to try the original egg coffee.

Food recommendation from Chef Mango of Thom Culinary, where we took the cooking class: here