Food Tour - Nha Trang, Vietnam

My family left Châu Đốc and headed up north to beachy areas. The first place we stopped at was Mui Ne. Because it was only for an afternoon, I won’t make a full post about it but the hotel where we stayed had an interesting boardwalk-like area where vendors were selling their wares. One of the interesting things was that there were these old women who got seafood straight from the waters (you could walk down to the beach right outside your hotel balcony/patio) and would cook whatever you wanted in front of you. I was most intrigued by the whole octopi that one woman was roasting but my mother made us steer away from such “dangerous” food, as she called everything she didn’t trust. Before we had reached Mui Ne, though, we had driven through dragonfruit country. I have some vines in my backyard of the stuff (wonderful fruit really and quite beautiful when growing) but there were fields and fields of these. I even got to see different types – did you know that dragonfruit comes in white, fuschia, and yellow flesh? They get sweeter in that order as well.

We didn't stay long at Mui Ne before we headed to Nha Trang, the most famous beach resort town in Vietnam. My brother (Conan) and I had looked up places to eat there through Wikitravel and despite our pushing and nudging, the only places our family visited were a bakery called Hoa Hung and a chocolatier called ChocoCiao. The bakery was pretty good actually (the red bean cakes were divine!) but the chocolate was quite mediocre. I'd chalk it up to the kind of chocolate that you get from off-brand companies during the holidays wrapped in foil as Santas or neon pink hearts.

What I want to speak more specifically about in this town with its beachy wonder and aside from the awesome night scene is what my mom and aunt said was famous there: nem nướng (grilled pork skewers). The place we went to was so packed that we had to go to their second location which was several stories high and also quite packed! However, it was all quite warranted as the food was delicious. We got the grilled pork with rice paper to wrap, fried rice paper, various greens, mango and cucumber, and the appropriate dipping sauce. I loved it! Conan and I also tried the three different Saigon beers they had to offer - nothing special from these unfortunately.

Overall, there were a lot of international restaurants in the area but it was unfortunate that we only stayed there two days and didn't have time to check the places all out. Nevertheless, if you're in the area, check out that nem nướng place!