60 Fun Facts About Vietnamese Food

A Vietnamese meal is built to balance how many fundamental tastes (ngũ vị)?

Sweet, salty, bitter, sour and spicy each map to one of the classical elements, and cooks aim for the same number of colours on the plate too.

Potatoes are called khoai tây in Vietnamese, a name that literally means what?

Ingredients the French brought in were often named after a similar native food plus tây, 'western': onions became western shallots and asparagus western bamboo shoots.

Phở is reputed to have emerged around 1900-1907 in which northern province southeast of Hanoi?

Villagers of Vân Cù there insist they were eating it long before the French arrived, and a villager named Vạn opened Hanoi's first province-style stand around 1925.

Phở first appears in written records from which period?

Georges Dumoutier's exhaustive 1907 account of Vietnamese cuisine does not mention it at all; a 1931 dictionary was the first to define it as a soup.

Why was beef historically uncommon in Vietnamese cooking before the colonial period?

Demand for beef only took off under French rule, which is why some historians credit the French with a hand in phở's birth.

One theory traces the word phở to which French beef dish?

Rival scholars point instead to the Cantonese street cry ngưu nhục phấn, 'beef noodles', with the final syllable worn down over time.

Phở gà appeared in 1939, possibly because beef was not sold at Hanoi markets on which days?

Rare-beef phở tái had already been introduced by 1930, and 1920s vendors even experimented with tofu and giant water bug extract.

Meatless state-canteen phở of the postwar subsidy period was nicknamed phở không người lái, meaning what?

The joke referred to the US Air Force's unmanned reconnaissance drones; the broth was often just boiled water with MSG.

Which accompaniments mark out southern-style phở from the northern original?

Southern broth is also sweeter and cloudier; northern phở stays clear and subtle, with quẩy dough sticks for dipping.

Along with cloves and black cardamom, which spice is a hallmark of the phở broth spice bag?

Cooks char the ginger and onion over an open flame first and skim constantly, which is the secret to a clear broth.

In 2017 Vietnam designated which date as the 'Day of Pho'?

Japan had already picked April 4 as its own Phở Day the year before.

What does the name bánh mì literally mean?

The pain de mie story is a false etymology: bánh has meant rice cakes and pastries since at least the 13th century, long before any French contact.

In WWI, Vietnamese bakers stretched baguettes with which cheap ingredient, which also made them fluffier?

That airy, thin-crusted loaf is what makes a Vietnamese baguette different from a Parisian one to this day.

Hòa Mã, among the first shops selling filled bánh mì thịt in 1958, opened in which city?

The 1954 partition sent over a million northerners south, transforming the city's food; another migrant sold sausage sandwiches from a basket on a mobylette.

Which cheap cheese, rejected French food aid, ended up stuffed into some 1950s bánh mì?

Until then sandwiches had stuck close to French taste, essentially a jambon-beurre with mayonnaise or liver pâté.

The shredded pickles (đồ chua) in a classic bánh mì are made from which two vegetables?

Fresh cucumber, coriander leaves and sliced chilies round out the standard garnish.

Where did Lee's Sandwiches, credited with popularising bánh mì among Americans, begin?

New Orleans later produced a 'Vietnamese po' boy' that won the 2009 Oak Street Po-Boy Festival, and Philadelphia sells a 'Vietnamese hoagie'.

What is waiting in the cup when the coffee drips through in a classic Vietnamese iced coffee?

Fresh milk spoiled fast in the tropics and dairy farming barely existed, so the shelf-stable tinned substitute became the standard.

What is the small metal drip filter used to brew Vietnamese coffee called?

Every Vietnamese coffee variation shares three things: Vietnamese-grown beans, this filter, and tinned milk if creamer is wanted.

Which coffee species, dark-roasted, is the standard for Vietnamese coffee?

Its extra bitterness, with nearly double the caffeine of arabica, was found to offset the sweetness of the milk.

Egg coffee (cà phê trứng) was created in Hanoi in 1946 in response to what?

Nguyễn Văn Giảng's invention tops coffee with a custard foam of whipped egg yolks and tastes something like tiramisu.

Salt coffee (cà phê muối), invented in 2010, tops the drink with what?

The salt sharpens the sweetness the way a pinch of salt intensifies caramel.

Bạc xỉu, mostly milk with a splash of coffee, originated in the 1950s among which Chợ Lớn community?

The name is a worn-down transliteration of the Cantonese for 'a cup of white milk with a little coffee'.

Which Hanoi dish did Barack Obama eat with Anthony Bourdain in May 2016?

Bún Chả Hương Liên still sells a 'combo Obama' and has photos of the visit on its walls.

The 'combo Obama' at the restaurant he visited includes the noodles, a fried seafood roll and what?

Food writer Vũ Bằng described Hanoi in 1959 as a town transfixed by the dish.

What does the name bánh xèo refer to?

It is essentially a crisp savoury crepe, folded around pork, prawns, mung beans and bean sprouts and wrapped in lettuce to eat.

What gives bánh xèo batter its yellow colour?

The related Huế pancake bánh khoái does use egg yolks in its batter and is shaped like a half-moon.

Mekong Delta (Miền Tây) bánh xèo are typically how big?

Central Vietnamese versions are palm-sized with fewer fillings, and often darker from a dose of fermented shrimp paste.

What are gỏi cuốn, the unfried Vietnamese rolls, wrapped in?

The sheet is dipped in water to soften, filled with pork, prawn, herbs and vermicelli, and served unfried at room temperature.

In Japan, gỏi cuốn are called nama harumaki, which means what?

Some Vietnamese American restaurants coined 'summer roll' as a seasonal marketing play to set the unfried version apart.

Vietnamese fish sauce (nước mắm) is made mainly from which fish?

Good bottles carry no additives, and Vietnamese buyers look for a clear, deep amber colour without a strong smell.

Which two places are Vietnam's most famous fish-sauce producers?

The latter has a fish sauce museum and is regarded as the birthplace of the Vietnamese product.

Vietnamese fish sauce traces its 300-year history back to which kingdom?

The Vietnamese took over Phan Thiết in 1693 and commercialised the sauce by barrelling it and selling it across the country.

The quality grade printed on a bottle of Vietnamese fish sauce (°N) measures what?

'First press' sauce, drained from the barrels the first time, is another mark of quality.

Besides fish sauce and water, what is the third main component of the dipping sauce nước chấm?

Lime and chili are added when it should be sour and spicy, and garlic is common too.

Which two flavours dominate the spicy beef noodle soup bún bò Huế?

Its orange colour comes from annatto seed oil, and in its home city it is a morning main meal rather than a breakfast snack.

How do the noodles in bún bò Huế differ from those in phở?

The Vân Cù noodle-makers who supply the dish claim over 400 years of practice.

Cao lầu, a chewy pork-and-noodle dish, is a specialty of which town?

Legend says the lye for the noodles must come from Cham Islands plant ash, which is why the dish is rarely found elsewhere.

What gives cao lầu noodles their springy texture and greyish-yellow colour?

Some raw noodles are also cut into squares and deep-fried to scatter on top as crunchy croutons.

Local legend says the water for cao lầu noodles must be drawn from which ancient source?

The other wells listed here supplied water for the Nguyễn emperors' table in Huế.

In the founding legend, prince Lang Liêu's square bánh chưng symbolises what?

Its round partner bánh giầy stands for the sky, and the poorest of the king's sons won the throne with the pair.

Along with glutinous rice and mung beans, what is the required filling of bánh chưng?

The fat is preferred over lean because it melts into the sticky rice during hours of boiling.

Bánh chưng is traditionally wrapped in what, which dyes the outer layer of rice green?

Banana leaves are the usual substitute where the original leaf, native to southern Asia, is unavailable.

Bánh chưng is an essential dish on the family altar at which festival?

A popular couplet lists the season's essentials: rich meats, pickled onions, red couplets, the nêu pole, firecrackers and green bánh chưng.

The breakfast snack hột vịt lộn, known abroad as balut, is what?

It is eaten in the shell with rau răm, salt and pepper, and a quail-egg version is a favourite student snack.

Under yin-yang food logic, 'cold' balut must be paired with which 'hot' herb?

By the same logic, 'cool' duck is served in summer with warming ginger fish sauce, while 'hot' pork is winter food.

What is nem chua?

The meat is coated in toasted rice powder, wrapped in gooseberry or Erythrina leaves and left to cure for a few days.

Chả quế is Vietnamese sausage that has been roasted with which spice?

Ordinary giò is ground pork wrapped in banana leaf and boiled for an hour per kilo.

Ô mai mơ, the most famous Vietnamese candied fruit, is made from which fruit?

The fruit is harvested from the forest around the Perfume Pagoda and coated in ginger and slivers of liquorice root.

How many chefs served on the Nguyễn dynasty's Thượng Thiện board that cooked for the king?

Lunch and dinner ran to 66 dishes each, and every dish was tasted by eunuchs and the king's wives before it reached him.

Which dish was considered essential at the Nguyễn emperors' table?

The other three were on the menu too, along with deer tendon, and the clay rice pots were thrown away after a single use.

In northern Vietnam, which spice traditionally supplies heat in place of chilies?

The cooler northern climate limits spice growing, so northern food is the lightest and least fiery of the three regions.

Which region is known for the spiciest cooking?

Its mountainous terrain grows the most spices, and the old royal court also left a taste for many small, decorative dishes.

The southern preference for sweetness shows in the widespread use of which ingredient?

Southern cooks also use coconut water in most stews and add more sweetener than the other regions.

Which TV chef called a hủ tiếu at Cần Thơ's floating market 'the greatest dish I have ever eaten'?

He liked it enough to set it as an elimination challenge for the finalists of MasterChef US.

Bánh phu thê, the 'husband and wife cake', is served at which occasion?

It is meant to remind the new couple of perfection and harmony.

The idiom Chán cơm thèm phở, 'tired of rice, craving noodle soup', means what?

Vietnamese has a whole family of eating idioms about affairs, including 'he eats meatballs, she eats spring rolls'.

Vietnamese curry (cà ri) is most commonly made with which meat?

It is a fixture at family gatherings and death anniversaries, eaten with bread, rice or round rice noodles.

Cơm chiên Dương Châu is the Vietnamese name for which Chinese dish?

Wonton, char siu, youtiao and mooncakes all arrived the same way and were given a Vietnamese twist.

Đuông dừa, the coconut worms eaten live in fish sauce in Trà Vinh, are the larvae of which insect?

They are served wriggling in salty fish sauce with chili peppers.