I must say the highlight of our trip to Ho Chin Minh City (HCMC) must be the food. It was the first time we didn't do a single touristy thing - no museums (though we did plan for it almost everyday, we didn't materialise to the end), no Cu Chi tunnels (which I heard is an absolute must-see for all visitors to Saigon) and no temples. Just purely gastronomic excursions (and a little shopping for homewares - more on that in another post). Even our last trip to Hanoi had at least 1 touristy thing on our itinerary - we went to Hai Long Bay for a day tripper.
Well, this trip was solely set out for seeking out the best Saigon had to offer. I did some research online (a big thank you and kudos to the awesome noodle pie), read the Lonely Planet and Luxe and watched Anthony Bordain's re-runs on cable. And off we went. On the first night, we set out to look for this hole-in-the-wall place that served everything with crabs. It was highly recommended by noodle pie and I just had to try it out for myself. We walked close to 45 minutes through back alleys, passed motos, cyclos, crazy cab drivers. I felt bad about dragging D along to look for this place which I wasn't even sure existed. But I couldn't forget those photos of the crunchy softshell crabs I saw online. We walked in almost pitch darkness in a seemingly endless road, when I suddenly spotted 'Quan 94' screaming out at me in neon brightness. You can't imagine the yelp that I came out from my mouth. (Imagine: Me hopping up and down, pointing to a signboard, while yelping "Quan 94! Quan 94!") Pretty hilarious, thank god the streets were empty.
We got seated and were served by well dressed ladies holding wads of dongs (all of them did) and I mean 4-inch thick wads. D whispered over, "the crabs must be good, the business is roaring". I agreed. We peeped over at neighbouring tables to see what yummy morsels they ordered. One of the ladies figured out rather quickly that we were tourists and came back with an idiot-proof picture menu. Phew! I thought we had to peer and point, which I hoped we didn't have to resort to. I ordered those must-have softshells, which I found out on our way out were still alive and kicking till 3 seconds before they were halved and battered and fried instantaneously. D wanted a veg dish, so we went with an ubiquitous stir fried kang kong. We saw a plate of golden yellow fried rice floating pass and decided to have one of those as well. And to finish off our crab feast, we ordered a whole crab - stir fried in assam gravy.
The verdict? Awesome. The fried rice was fragrant without being mushy. With each bite I found huge chunks of crab. The best thing was the fact that every grain was evenly coated with egg yolk, giving off this wonderful golden hue. The assam crab was sweet and sour at the same time and was as fresh as it can get. The lady pointed to the little dish of salt & pepper, indicating to us, the clueless tourists that we had to dip the peeled crab into it. (I found it too salty for my taste, I think flaked sea salt would work better here) The softshell crab was the best deep fried anything I have even tasted. It was light and crisp without the over cloying oiliness of fried food. It was tastier than tempura as the batter was nicely seasoned and had a nice bite to it. It was served with a tangy thai-style chilli sauce which complemented it perfectly.
Though the walk was terribly long, we had no qualms of walking back to our hotel. We had a belly full of crab we needed to digest and what better way to do it than to take in the sights of Saigon and rave to each other what a spectacular meal we just had.
