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Pork, spring rolls and noodles await diners along Dong Khoi. Opposite: Customers of Mrs. Thao must eat across the street from her stand.
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On Dong Khoi Street, Saigon’s most eminent address, there is a much-loved, family-owned food stand tucked down a dark passageway that runs through the ground floor of a shabby yet evocative French colonial building. A bowl of noodles costs about a dollar less than a single espresso upstairs in L’Usine, one of the city’s trendiest cafés. This stall has no name. There’s no menu. Walk the hallway of painters lining the Art Arcade, pass the indoor motorbike parking lot, and find a seat. You’ll be promptly served bun thit nuong cha gio—where the main protagonists are strips of marinated barbecued pork and one sliced-up, deep-fried spring roll that rest on a bed of cold, airy rice noodles. Add a smidgeon—or, for the initiated, a glob—of chili paste and pour the dish
of nuoc cham (fish sauce, water, lime juice, sugar) over it all. Use your spoon and chopsticks to churn up the herbs and greens from the bottom, and savor the essence of Vietnamese cuisine in one glorious mouthful. The family behind this operation has been making this dish since 1954. “I come here regularly. They buy ingredients at the market in the early morning,” says Chau, a 32-year-old employee at Saigontourist. “This feels safer to us than lunch-delivery services and it’s much cheaper than restaurants or hotels around here.” For residents like Chau, “comfort” doesn’t come in the form of an ACchilled room and a post-lunch espresso. No, comfort is more Proustian: a delicious, affordable meal made by someone you trust.
But those bonds are forcibly being broken as the Vietnamese economy recovers its composure and Saigon, the country’s financial lynchpin, barrels ahead with development. New high-rises are springing up all around District 1, with more ambitious proposals in the pipeline, including a much-needed, city-wide metro system whose central station will be a stone’s throw from the Opera House—across the street from Chau’s favorite noodle bolt hole. This prime, Dong Khoi real estate has been earmarked for a US$70 million, mixed-use project. To facilitate the city’s makeover, historic architecture in what is the exceedingly charming, oldest part of former French Indochina is being demolished. Losing these louvereddoor, shuttered-window, colonnaded buildings will scatter the street-food vendors that have been in their shadows for generations to the wind. “With new laws, prosperity and redevelopment, I think it’s safe to say
that street food will vanish from District 1 in the next five to 10 years,” says Graham Holliday, the author of the new food-inspired memoir, Eating Vietnam: Dispatches from a Blue Plastic Table. “At the most basic level, the area will lose good, cheap food.” At a more philosophical level, it will lose the bedrock of its culinary culture. “It’s a hard thing to square: preservation and development,” Graham continues. “It’s hard to see where street food and, more generally, street life, fits into any vision of a modern, developed city.” So, before it all comes tumbling down, I decided to enjoy the tastiest dishes by some of the city center’s most iconic vendors you’ll never read about in a guidebook. BACK IN OCTOBER 1929, a hotel at No. 1 Nguyen Trung Truc saw 30 delegates found a precursor to the Communist Party of Vietnam. Today, the hotel is long-gone but an equally good reason to visit this historic site
between the Opera House and Ben Thanh Market is for the version of bun thit nuong cha gio served out front. The de-skewered chunks of pork are thick and succulent, the crunchy spring roll is positively sumptuous and the use of herbs just-so. The stand here once commanded a long section of pavement. Last year, a pizzeria opened two doors up and cut into this space. Now sandwiched between two jewelry shops, the family slinging these noodles puts up its plastic chairs and folding tables on the other side of the street against the boarding of an idle development—a 40-story tower that, if built, would feature apartments, offices, restaurants and a department store. Mrs. Thao, the fiftysomething head honcho at the stall, insists they’re not going anywhere, but she’s playing a game of inches. Should the tower project across the road come back online, her 35-year-old institution will be reduced to a paltry piece of turf.
Getting the squeeze on Nguyen Trung Truc. From right: Grilling pork for bun thit nuong cha gio on Dong Khoi; along Hai Ba Trung, Mr. Chau’s bo kho stall. Above: The Bitexco Tower.
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Perhaps Loi is just playing it close to the vest. After all, not far away, in the shadow of the 68-story Bitexco Financial Tower—Saigon’s current summit—a small eatery profits nicely from the skyscraper’s office workers, shoppers and cinema-goers. Mr. Hai’s family’s spot has been here for 40 years brewing pho bo tai (pho with rare beef), pho bo vien (beef balls) or the more unusual pho bo sate—pho in a creamy peanut broth, a delicious but distinctly southern creation that would have northern purists yelling blasphemy. This is a must-try for any foodie looking to grasp Vietnam’s subtle regional culinary quibbles. I worry that it won’t withstand the boom. Hai waves away my concerns, but after the 66-year-old paterfamilias walks out of earshot, one of his staff discreetly scribbles something down on a piece of paper. “When you come back, if we’re not here,” she says, “go to this address.” That, I believe, is what you call a contingency plan. +
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What will stand here then? He shrugs and points at the gleaming green, high-rise luxury mall down the road: “Probably something like that.” Or something like the 35-floor Vietcombank tower, in its final phases of construction on Mac Thi Buoi Street near the Saigon River. Across that street is a 55-year old noodle shop run by a Chinese family. The sole dish on offer is mi hoanh thanh—egg noodles with slivers of roast pork and wontons served in a light pork broth. This treat is served here every morning and every evening. My only complaint is they close for lunch. Surely a new office building teeming with hungry people will be a boon for the family. Owner Mr. Loi isn’t so sure. Business is brisk enough: he sells more than 500 bowls a day, and he could afford to take his family to the beach over the Tet holiday. “But the economy is still troubled,” Loi says like a man who isn’t in the business of counting his chickens too soon.
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their ladles, there will be no one to make the soup—at least not as well. “I don’t think any of these streetfood sellers see themselves as carrying on Vietnamese traditions and promoting Vietnamese culture, although in our eyes that is very much a part of what they do,” Graham says. “It’s just what they do to make money.” Take the mild-mannered 42-yearold Mr. Chau on the quiet corner of Hai Ba Trung and Le Thanh Ton streets. His stall’s specialty is bo kho, a lightly spiced, thick stew imbued with star anise and lemongrass, and laden with chunks of carrot and beef tendon. The dish comes with a cluster of herbs (pluck and drop to your heart’s content) and a crusty banh mi for dunking and devouring. “We’ve been here for 22 years, but I think we will be gone in five,” he says without a flicker of discernible sentiment. I am impressed by his stoic attitude but I will mourn the loss of his bo kho when he gets the heave-ho.
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Culinary and colonial heritage also meet just off Dong Khoi, at 39 Ngo Duc Ke. A placard on the outside indicates that the building was once the headquarters of a French company: société des plantations d’hévéas de xuan-loc, a curious detail that hints at the French-Indochine rubber-farm legacy but won’t prevent the house being flattened one day. Now, a small family-run noodle shop specializes in bun bo hue, a hearty, lemongrassinfused soup served with thick rice noodles and chunks of beef sausage, beef shank and a pork knuckle to boot. This zesty, yet soothing central Vietnamese dish is ubiquitous in 21stcentury Saigon, but brewed best by two middle-aged sisters, Mai and Hong, who have been making it for 40 years. They, too, insist they will stand their ground. But development is only one reason this killer bowl of noodles is endangered: Mai has no children and Hong’s adult daughter sells art for a living. When these sisters hang up
CO THAO’S BUN THIT NUONG CHA GIO
MAI AND HONG’S BUN BO HUE STALL
BUN MAM DAC SAN
QUOC KY PHO BO VIEN
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T L Guide Bun mam, fermented fish broth stew, near Ben Thanh Market. From right: Forty years of brewing at Quoc Ky Pho Bo Vien; the egg noodles for Mr. Loi’s mi hoanh thanh.
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Quoc Ky Pho Bo Vien 54 Ngo Duc Ke; open 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. House specialties: pho bo tai, VND60,000; pho bo sate and pho bo vien, VND70,000 each. Mr. Chau’s Bo Kho + Bit Tet Stall 74E Hai Ba Trung; open 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Specialties: bo kho banh mi, VND30,000; bo bit tet (steak, egg, pâté, fries), VND50,000. Mai and Hong’s Bun Bo Hue Stall 39 Ngo Duc Ke; open 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. House specialty: bun bo hue dac biet, VND50,000. Dong Khoi Bun Thit Nuong Cha Gio 151/3 Dong Khoi; open 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. House specialty: bun thit nuong cha gio, VND34,000. Co Thao’s Bun Thit Nuong Cha Gio 1 Nguyen Trung Truc; open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. House speciality: bun thit nuong cha gio, VND40,000. Mr Loi’s Mi Hoanh Thanh 2 Mac Thi Buoi;
open 6 a.m. to 11 a.m, 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. House specialty: mi hoanh thanh, VND37,000. Banh Mi Ba Lac Sitting at the front of a camera shop (and getting all the business), this hugely popular sandwich shop’s signature roll is a scrumptious pork-fest: pork floss, slivers of roast pork, pork sausage and pork liver pâté. 46 Nguyen Hue; open 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. House specialty: banh mi thit, VND15,000. Bun Mam Dac San Shrimp, catfish, squid, eggplant, and yes, pork belly, too, all sitting in a fermented fish broth with a side of veg (sprouts, garlic, chives, mint, cilantro, perilla and banana blossom), this southern classic is best eaten right on the street for breakfast or dinner. 22 Phan Boi Chau, beside Ben Thanh Market; open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. House specialty: bun mam, VND65,000.
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