Hu Tieu


Noodles are ubiquitous in Ho Chi Minh City.
Skinny rice noodles, fat ones, egg noodles. Noodles boiled and fried.
Each morning the decision must be mad: what variety of noodle, in what type of soup and with which accompanying ingredients?
Pho is the standard nighttime snack. For mornings it tends to be hu tieu or bun.
We went and had hu tieu - thin rice noodles in a delicious broth. It is called hu tieu nam vang, or Phnom Penh Noodles. Me being an old fashioned country boy, I like to take mine as plain as possible - with a few slices of boiled pork. I add my own lime, mung bean sprouts and mint. But the people with me had a number of additions: prawns and offal, for the most part. I'm just not big on prawns and offal. Especially not in combination.
It is pouring with rain this morning, and I don't really want to go out onto Tan Binh's filthy and probably flooded streets to brave a breakfast, though the clock is ticking and my stomach is rumbling. I may content myself with the made-in-Indonesia Kit Kat I have been storing in my fridge for just such a rainy day. Tastes like mud, but it's sustenance.

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