A Morning Aboard Ship in Halong

We woke up to some pretty amazing views .. I could have been quite happy sailing around the bay for a few more days but time was short and we were due to board a train to Hue that evening from Hanoi. Ahhh... but it was so peaceful, so calm... I could really get used to this...


We were provided with a morning snack before going off to tour some caves. We were each given a plate of an assortment of mini pastries. Jo's plate above had (clockwise from top) a dinky croissant, a pain au raisin and a muffin. My plate held (clockwise from top) tiny pain au chocolat, a pain au raisin and a flower shaped concoction.


The pastries were ultra buttery and just sweet enough to keep me going before we went cave exploring. The flower shaped pastry turned out to be short crust pastry topped with sweetened grated coconut. Good thing this dinky little thing ended up on my plate - Jo isn't very fond of coconut :)

The caves were pretty darn amazing but let down by the hordes of tourists whose only mode of communicating with each other was by shouting, camera flashes going off every two seconds and staff from the boat reminding us to move on (to ensure we followed their rigid timetable). Ahhh..complains ;) I can only imagine what this place is like at peak season! My photos from the caves are pretty fuzzy but I refused to use my flash in there but I did get this photo overlooking the bay as we were leaving. Pretty amazing, huh?


Back on board, we were served some proper, filling breakfast before we disembarked. This time it was buffet style (yay!!) and I got myself a slice of ham, some toast (which looked like it needed a bit longer in the toaster), half a grilled tomato, baked beans, a few slices of grilled sausages, a weeny bit of bacon and a slice of smoked salmon with 4 capers :D It wasn't too bad - standard breakfast fare. I went overboard with dinner the night before (dim lighting + hungry tummy = fuzzy photos..hehe) and I had to calm down a little for breakfast.

Their offer of a local speciality was pho bo - rice noodles in a clear beef broth with thinly sliced beef, garnished with coriander, sweet basil, spring onion, chillies and lime. The broth was nice, delicate and refreshing rather than the usual in your face beefy goodness. I thoroughly enjoyed it and would probably have gone back for some more if a) I hadn't eaten so much the night before b) the dining room wasn't so small, with so few of us that I felt the staff were counting how many trips I made to get some food.

Some fruit (watermelon, orange, pear) to make myself feel as if I've eaten something healthy that day and some chocolate cake to un-do all the goodness of the fruit :D The chocolate cake was quite light, almost fluffy with a dash of butter cream in the middle and a spread of chocolate ganache over the top.

Sailing In Halong

Halong had been on my list of must see places since I watched Indochine years and years ago, when I fancied myself in love with Vincent Perez...ahh.... ;) Halong was certainly beautiful but the itenarary imposed on us by company that ran the boat, Indochina Sails, was so rigid (2.30pm - swim, 2.45pm- take shower, 3.oopm - visit fishing village -you get the idea), I almost imagined that I was back at school :)

After a 4 hour journey from Hanoi that started at 8.30am, I was starving and really looking forward to lunch. To start, cream of pumpkin soup that was served in an elegant little bowl. The white swirls on the soup was coconut cream. A thick smooth soup with good pumpkin flavour that was a definite welcome to my tummy but I was so hungry, I was wanted more, MORE!


As soon as we were done with the soup, the bowls were whisked away and replaced by plates of green papaya with dry beef salad. A more polished version of what we had in Hanoi by Hoan Kiem lake, it was very tasty but yet again the whine......It was dismally small.

Next up, fresh rice paper rolls with prawn and mango. On the side was a little dish of nuoc nam or as they called it on the menu, 'traditional fish sauce'. As fresh rice paper rolls go, this was very light and refreshing but oh-so-tiny! You can tell by the photo on the left how small they were. Not so much on the length but the width - it was less than 2 fingers wide. I'm all for fine, delicate dining - just as long as I'm not feeling ravenous. I thought they were taking it a little far with the small servings, sigh... they could have at least served up two rolls.. I would have whined a little less lol



Yummy fried Halong shrimp with tamarind sauce. The prawn (yes, ONE) was very fresh, almost crunchy in it's freshness. The sauce was bordering on sweet rather than sour (as I assumed a tamarind sauce would at least be slightly tart). Togther, it made very good eating.


Pan fried chicken breast with lemon - which was actually pan fried chicken leg with lime leaves in tomato-y oil. It was rather delicious with nice caramelized bits and I was quite thrilled to find it was dark meat. I was still starving after eating this and shovelled down the decorative tomato flower that can be side at the top right of the photo. It would have done quite nicely with some pipping hot white rice.

This was the Special Indochina Sails Grilled Fish, which looked liked a posh version of cha ca, another dish we enjoyed while we were in Hanoi. The fish was was deep fried in saffron tempered oil and served up with deep fried dill, chillies and garlic. On the side was a handful (small;) of vermicelli and a sauce that was not particularly memorable. Compared to what we had at Cha Ca La Vong, I actually preferred this version. There was more flavour to this with the bits of deep fried chili and garlic.

Dessert - a fruit cocktail, little cubes of watermelon, dragonfruit and pineapple, with yogurt. As the pieces of dragonfruit were so small, I quite happily ate it with the other fruit. The yogurt was light, refreshing and rounded up the meal nicely.

Fooding Around Hanoi

Green Papaya Salad

Wandering around the Old Quarter near Hoan Kiem lake, we found this lady with her little stall selling what we thought were noodles. It wasn't until we had sat ourselves down on a teeny-weeny stools did we realise it was green papaya salad topped with fresh herbs, peanuts and bo kho (dried beef) served with lots of nuoc nam. Having never eaten green papaya salad before, I found it very light and refreshing eve if the dried beef was a little hard and chewy at times. Jo wasn't too keen on this dish as she's not a peanut fan (the woman was very generous in her portions and that's Jo scraping all her peanuts onto my plate - I love peanuts! :) There were extra bottles of chili sauce for those who wanted their salad spicy.

We sat by the woman for about 15 minutes and loads of locals stopped by for an afternoon snack. She had everything prepared and once someone sat down she'll grab a plate from a stack by her side and start piling on shredded papaya, cut the fresh herbs with a pair of scissors, load on the meat, sprinkle on the peanuts and splash on the sauce, kept handy by her side in a red carrier basket (seen in the bottom right of the above photo). Dish is served in no more than a minute or 2 of sitting down and all for less than US$0.80, brilliant!!

Fanny's Ice-Cream

I spotted a recommendation for this place in the guidebook and couldn't resist! Could you? Fanny's Ice Cream (lol) is located by Hoan Kiem lake and decorated with the air of a French cafe. There are loads of flavours to choose, from the usual suspects - chocolate, vanilla, strawberry to the more 'local' flavours of yam and mango. I went with chocolate chip (I'm still not quite sure why I went for such a boring flavour...) which was...well...boring, mango in the middle which was made with real mango and really yummy and last, the flavour at the other end of the bowl was com (young sticky rice). Having read about it I went to Fanny's hoping to try (as it's a season flavour) this strange, new flavour which was creamy, sweet and mellow. Quite delicious.

Cake

Who can resist a bit of cake? Especially chocolate cake? Another of the French colonial legacies in Vietnam - French style baked goods. Gluttons that we are (me more so than Jo...as the heat and humidity really wore her down), we indulged in a few bakery visits around the Old Quarter. Some were better than others but here's a particularly yummy chocolate mouse cake (more mousse than cake), which was light enough for our dinner filled bellies but chocolate-y enough to satiate our cravings.


Highlands Coffee

A local chain modelled after your usual American coffee shop (think Starbucks, CoffeeBean). A godsend in the oppressive afternoon heat! Jo and I were at the point of snapping at each other (yup, you'll know what I mean if you've ever spent everyday, every minute .. with another person, travelling) when we called a coffee break. Located in a building overlooking the Haon Kiem lake, we plonked ourselves on a couple of sofas by the windows which thankfully had a nice breeze coming through.

I'm a real sucker for ice-blended coffees - icy, creamily smooth..emm.. My guilty conscience usually tells (commands) me to say no to the cream but I happily lapped most of this mountain of creamy goodness (the waitress didn't ask if I wanted any, she piled it on all her own and I couldn't possibly have let her down LOL). The little brown specks on top of the cream are bits of ground coffee, which I usually dislike (why would anyone want to bite into hunky bits of coffee??I'm happy just to drink it, thank you!) but these bits were so fine, it passed right by my radar for bitter coffee bits.

Jo opted for a fruity slushy/smoothie. I think it was mango... it was nice and icy and really refreshing.

Cafe 69, 69 Ma May Street

Sadly, as average priced food went, Cafe 69 was probably the best we had while in Hanoi. Slightly downtrodden on our food choices so far, we headed to this restaurant just metres away from our hotel. With a bar downstairs and a restaurant up a flight of rickety stairs (yes, another of those, argh!), Cafe 69 is a restored Tonkin tube style house (according to a sign by the main entrance - though I have no idea what a Tonkin tube style house is - Google has let me down this time).

First up, some Bun Cha (yes, i know....what were we doing eating this in a restaurant when there's a stall selling this at nearly every street corner?looking back..I honestly don't know..) with vermicelli, grilled meat patties, spring rolls, greens and a dipping sauce of fish sauce, vinegar, sugar and chillies. I really quite enjoyed this but I'm guessing this was nowhere as good as those roadside stalls we passed with wafts of smoke from meat being char-grilled. The spring rolls made with rice paper wrappers were filled with minced pork, wood ear fungus and glass noodles were crispy and delicious.

While the spring roll that accompanied the bun cha were made with rice paper wrappers, these were made with flour-based wrappers - much to my disappointment. I love the other sort and was really hoping (rather greedily) for a full portion. The filling was similar and nothing to shout about. We also had some very yummy caramel pork - luscious chunks of pork belly braised in a dark caramel sauce with lots of garlic and chillies. The meat was melting tender and went beautifully with rice.

To Cha Ca La Vong For Some Cha Ca

Touted as a bit of a Hanoi institution, this one dish restaurant was high on the list of must trys when we were in the city. Jo and I had already made it across Indochina in one piece by ourselves (the rest having left us to our own devices for the comfort of KL). We even managed to get from Hanoi airport to the hotel safely (not terribly hard since we had already arranged for a car beforehand - thank heavens for tripadvisor.com!) but as soon as stepped out of our hotel, we were almost tripping over ourselves in panic :) Perhaps we should have wandered out when it was still light but the comfort of the air-condition and internet in the room was just too much of a lure to stay in. But we made it out eventually and walked straight into the chaos that makes Hanoi's Old Quarter a gem. Motorcycles coming from every direction, pavements blocked by parked motorbikes, incessant hooting .... ohhh a nightmare, especially if you've just arrived from the sleepy backwater that is Siem Reap!
Grumpy and hungry, Jo and I stumbled upon Cha Ca Street and a few feet away from dinner! The restaurant is tiny but we were ushered up a flight of creaky stairs (it creaked so badly I didn't know if I should just leg it up or close my eyes, pray really hard, hold my weight and creep up very, VERY slowly). The floorboards upstairs weren't any better but hey... if it manages to hold so many people for this long, I guess I really don't have much to worry about. Seated, we were pushed a piece of paper that said something along the lines of 'We only serve one dish Cha Ca' along with the price - which I can't remember. Something laughably low if you have foreign cash to spend.
Within minutes of us nodding to the man who had to make sure we really did want to eat Cha Ca, a little charcoal fired stove was brought to us with a pan of sizzling fish in oil. We also got a plate of bun (cold vermicelli noodles), peanuts, chopped red chillies, nuoc cham (a dipping sauce made with lime, fish sauce, sugar, chili and water) and two huge piles of herbs. The man then starts stirring our fish that is still sizzling madly in the saffron tempered oil while throwing lots of herbs in from the first pile he brought over of mainly spring onions and dill. After a few stirs, the man seems satisfied the herbs had cooked down and points to the noodles and condiments he brought over earlier and then to an empty bowl. That's our cue to tuck in. Noodles in, peanuts, chillies, herbs (coriander, mint, basil and even more dill this time), fish, lots of oil and nuoc nam over the top. It was good and it was interesting... but dare I say it? I over-anticipated this place and it let me down. This is awful... I sound terrible but I did really want it to be very good. It was quite an experience and really quite fun but ohhhh the dampening of the spirit ........!

Cambodian Eats - Cambodia part 4

I must admit I didn't fall in love with Cambodian food. It has all the flavour I love - garlic, lime juice, chillies, fish sauce - but I found something lacking... not sure if I can put my finger on it. But perhaps I wasn't looking beyond the tourist mould?I'll have give it another go at some point.

Nhom kra-oa ch'rook - lotus root salad from the FCC Angkor hotel restaurant - the Angkor Kitchen. An interesting dish on the menu but sadly uninspiring on the plate. According to the menu, there was supposed to be caramelised pork, smoked shrimp, fried shallots in a hot and sour dressing. The chunks of lotus root did come with beansprouts, dried (rather than smoked?) shrimp and nuggets of .. dried-out pork. Tang came from the squeeze of lime which came with the dish but other than that, the flavours were flat - if any at all.

Apparently the 'national dish' of Cambodia (up there with Amok), the Angkor Kitchen's version of Lok Lak Saich Go was delicious!Well marinated, tender slices of beef in a sweet, salty 'Cambodian bbq' with a fried egg on top served with a steamed rice and a little serving of 'mixed sauce'. Where lok lak tasted bland and almost .. lifeless at the other places I tried it, the flavours were bursting forth here with the other important factor of some very good meat. And here is where my problem probably lies... the need of flavour. A tongue brought up on too much of the good life? :) Pricewise, this dish (jazzed up for foreign taste buds?) did set me back a whole lot more than if we had headed to a local restaurant down the road. What the heck... I loved this it!

The others picked an assortment of non-Khmer dishes. Here is a very bad photo (sorry!) of the grilled sirloin with dauphinoise potato, green beans and optional sauce of mushroom and something else which I cannot remember.

The Chinese poached chicken with lime and coriander rice dumplings, spring onion and ginger sambal. I don't think my mother was terrible impressed with the dumplings as she ended ordering a separate bowl of rice - which in Angkor Kitchen terms was the Steamed Battambang rice with roasted coconut (not pictured).

I've been racking my brains for the name of this restaurant but I still can't remember it. But it's located 5 doors down from Khmer Kitchen on the same street. First up, Banana Flower Salad. I know the Malays at home eat the banana flower but I don't believe I've ever had any. This was rather yummy with lots of herbs and other crunchy vegetables. Rather like a Thai style salad.

For those who are totally indecisive on which Amok (normally fish steamed in a thick coconut based curry but with the hordes of tourists, one can have this dish with different meats or go vegetarian) to go for, have the Amok Degustation. The five little banana leaf wrapped parcels contain fish, chicken, pork, beef and vegetables. Interesting concept but after a while it gets a little boring sampling bits of meat, then fish, then a bit of veg - all cooked in the same sauce. For 6 people, we did have a whole lot more dishes but I soon learnt that every restaurant we went to in Cambodia and Vietnam had pretty dim lighting, which meant plenty of very fuzzy photos! Yup, these were the best of the lot! :(

Dessert! We must be truly indecisive people :) One of the desserts up was the Sorbet Degustation. This was definitely more interesting than the Amok Degustation! Sorbet flavours from the top: lime (which was lip smacking-ly sour ... lovely!!), passion fruit (not a favourite of mine as I'm not keen on the fruit), coconut (rich), mango (yummy!) and pear (pretty good).

Grilled Bananas with a palm sugar and coconut caramel sauce was very tasty. The palm sugar gave the caramel a very tasty twist and the coconut cream made it nicely thick and luscious. The bananas were the little ones and full of flavour but I did get a unripe piece - yuck! I hate the texture and taste of bananas that haven't fully ripen (I actually prefer my bananas with nice big brown spots with any lingering green bits long gone).

Breakfast on our last day in Cambodia. As part of our B&B deal with the hotel, we got to choose from a selected breakfast menu. I chose the breakfast panini with scrambled eggs, bacon and drizzled with lemon oil. A little oily but very tasty. Although I like lots of flavour in my food, I really dislike the strong smell/taste of pork. I say this with some embarrassment as I was brought up on a strong diet of pork (the Chinese love their pork!) and I do love it but just not all pork dishes. I tend to stay away from pork chops, pork scratchings and now...the bacon pictured above. Thickly sliced, it was bacon in all it's pork-y glory but just a little too much for me :)

A bowl of mixed fruit with cubes of watermelon, pineapple, apple and dragonfruit (which I find .. I'm tempted to say pointless ... but let's instead go with bland and tasteless). Unless it's cut up into tiny bits and mixed in with other fruit, I'm not inclined to eating it. Jo, on the other, rather enjoyed dragonfruit and I gave her mine.

Chocolate Brownie from The Blue Pumpkin cafe in Siem Reap town right by the market square. It was a nice brownie with a touch of coffee coming through (too much as addicted chocoholic Jo proclaimed- who unsurprisingly dislikes coffee). On our first day in Cambodia, we wandered down to the cafe and Edwin (another of our party) bought a croissant which was oh sooo good! But the day we went back to stock up on goodies for our trip to Vietnam, the displayed baked goods were swarmed with flies and I wasn't going to take a chance and opted for a pre-packaged brownie.

Temples Galore - Cambodia part 3

Angkor Wat at sunset, on a slightly overcast evening

What would a visit to Siem Reap be without a few temples thrown in? To be honest, I didn't read up on anything before leaving on this trip, which I usually do - I liked to be prepared. But I wasn't the tour guide as I usually am when I go away with Stuart so even now, weeks later, I am still a little clueless on what a few of these temples are. They are terribly beautiful, photograph amazingly well and I was definitely in awe :)

Early morning, Angkor Wat

Bayon - beautifully chaotic architecture

Bayon - of many faces

Banteay Srey - pink is for girls! -"Citadel of the Women"

Ta Prohm - of ancient trees

Ta Prohm - entrance to ancient Khmer civilization

Banteay Kdei - across the moat to the inner sanctuary

Banteay Kdei - inner sanctuary

Angkor Wat in the distance - as the crowds ascend Phnom Bakheng for sunset - no such luck -rain!