Pure Vietnam Beauty & Spa Nha Trang Blog

This blog is primarily used to showcase some of the community work we do in and around Nha Trang. Thanks to our staff and customers who help make this happen. We will also from time to time, post some of the great street food available in Nha Trang as well as a few off the tourist map places to go.

Nha Trang is famous for its street food, from Pho to Seafood. It is fresh, tasty and traditional. Listed here are a few places we have eaten at for many years, along with listings of new ones as we find them. Most food will be served to you with a variety of sauces. Here is just a few, green sauce which is chili (reasonably hot), red sauce which is chili (mild), salt and pepper ground together with a slice of lemon (you squeeze the lemon into the salt and pepper and stir), mayonnaise, sometimes a mild chili sauce that is orange-red. Vietnamese are lovers of chili and lemon.

Bun Bo (Hue)

Bun Bo (Hue)


This dish is eaten at any time of the day. I like to have this for breakfast particularly if I am feeling a little delicate. For dinner I like Bun Bo Heo, which has the same broth but with the added bonus of a hunk of pork.


Bun means thick noodles and Bo means beef — Bun Bo Hue is most often based on a pork-intensive stock, with small amounts of braised or raw beef added as a garnish. The noodle in Nha Trang is thicker than that added in the northern parts of Vietnam.

Bun Bo originated in Hue, a former capital of Vietnam. Outside the city of Hue and some parts of Central Vietnam, it is called bún bò Huế to denote its origin. Within Huế and surrounding cities, it is known simply as bún bò. The broth is prepared by simmering beef bones and beef shank with lemongrass and then seasoned with fermented shrimp sauce and sugar for taste. Very spicy chili oil is added later during the cooking process. Bun Bo is spicy, sour, salty, and sweet all at once. The beef and pork based broth’s main flavor is the delicate infusion of lemongrass. The rice noodles are cylindrical and round, slippery and firm.

Bun Bo normally consists of the thick noodles with slices of beef and it routinely has cubes of congealed pig blood, which is dark brown in color. The texture resembles tofu and the taste is fairly mild. It is easily avoided if you don’t want to eat it.

A stock is kept simmering then room temperature noodles are placed in a strainer normally dipped in hot water and then placed in a bowl. Raw beef or pre cooked beef is added along with the blood and then the stock is placed over to heat everything up.

It is commonly served with lime wedges, sometimes a mix of lettuce, shaved banana flower, mint leaves and bean sprouts, there is always the various mixes of chili ranging from hot to blow your head off hot, soy sauce and sometimes fish sauce.

We like to have this for breakfast in Dang Tat street – 20 000 VND or if we are closer to the city at breakfast time, on the corner of Phan Chu Trinh and Le Loi Street – 40 000VND. Dinnertime it has to be on the sidewalk near ABC bakery on Phan Chu Trinh Street between the two round abouts – 30 000 VND.

 

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Seafood - "Hai San" - Dong Xuan restaurant, Thap Ba Street

Fresh Seafood - Hai San

There is an amazing range of fresh seafood available in Nha Trang cooked in many different ways. We like to eat seafood in a few places but the main place we like to eat if we want a reasonable amount is Thap Ba Street. We go to a restaurant called Dong Xuan. It is the first restaurant on the left hand side after you turn in from Tran Phu Street. It is north of the city over the bridge. You are out of the main tourist area but some tourists will come here.We bring many of our customers here and always bring family and friends here.


The prices are lower than in the city and it is popular with the locals so the turnover of food is good meaning it is fresh. Out the front of the restaurant is the seafood set up in baskets in water some with oxygen being pumped in to keep it alive. You can pick what you want and choose how much (by weight), normally negotiate a price and decide how you want it cooked. There is a menu for hotpots, rice and vegetable. All food is served with a great array of sauces. I don't like chilli and so they give me soy without chilli.


We like prawns (Tom), crab (Ghe) and shell (like a vongole). The shell is cooked in a broth with lemongrass and chilli, prawns are steamed as is the crab. This is finger licking good. One kg of prawns, 1 kg of shell, 4 crabs a couple of beers and soft drinks for four people cost us 762 000 VND $36 USD. You always pay for hand towels too (2 000VND each). We couldn’t fit anymore in.


This is our bill for feeding 4 adults and drinks. $36.00

There is small seating out the front (local place) and inside the restaurant is big seats with tables that have tablecloths. You can choose.

While you sit here there is a large range people hoping to entertain you with music, dancing and magic. They sing or dance and their friend will come around and sell you some sugared peanuts or crackers and this is how they make money.

There is also a range of people selling many things from rice cakes, lotto, green mango, chewing gum and if you are lucky enough coconut jelly. I love this. We bought some for 6 000VND each. This one is particularly good incorporating coconut milk and well as coconut water. This little boy (who is eight) was selling green apple and chilli salt. He looked hungry so we gave him crab (which he had never had) and a coconut jelly to eat (which he loved). He would be at school all day and then out with his mother selling food trying to earn money at night.


 

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Banh Can (rice flour cake with many different fillings)

Banh Can (rice flour cake with many different fillings)


Banh can are small round cakes made of rice flour batter, baked over a charcoal fire on a special plate that has rounded hollows and these have little cast iron lids that go over each hollow. The cakes are then served with a combination of fried green onion, fish sauce and thinly-shredded green mango (you add to your taste) mixed with mouthwatering sauce of lemon juice, garlic, sugar and red pepper.

There can be many fillings. Quail eggs (Trung cut), squid (Muc), prawns (Tom), beef (Bo), chicken eggs (Trung Ga) and small snails (Hen) are some of the combinations I have seen. Chicken or quail eggs can be added to the batter for another variation on the cake. The eggs change the color from white to yellow.


You can get a pork ball in the sauce while you are waiting and this is called Xiu Mai (10 000vnd each). These are delicious.


There are many places to buy these but only on the streets. It is an afternoon or evening snack or meal.


This place (51 To Hien Thanh) is we think, the best in Nha Trang. It is a husband and wife team. She does the cooking and he does the serving and taking orders. He can speak a little English but pointing is also effective. It offers a mixed plate of six pieces, normally this is enough for one, costing 60 000 vnd. You can get all of one or none of what you don't like. I personally am not much a fan of the Hen (small snail) but I love everything else. They are open after 3pm most nights. Some evenings there is quite a crowd so it can be a wait but it is worth it.

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