Of Love and Rice: the food of Hanoi

Good Food, a food column by Jennifer Brizzi

Of love and rice: a new daughter and a new cuisine in Hanoi

This column originally ran in August of 2001 in Taconic Weekend, Taconic Press, Millbrook, New York

Imagine a cuisine based on fruit, vegetables and fluffy rice, where a myriad of flavors both exotic and familiar to the Western palate blend symphonically on the taste buds. Vietnamese food is light, flavorful, colorful and exciting, and last month I had the opportunity to experience it firsthand, when my husband and I traveled to Hanoi, Vietnam to meet our two-month-old daughter Sofia, whom we will go back to fetch in October.

Meeting Sofia at the orphanage was a delight made indescribable by the joy of finally holding our own child after a life-long yearning. A side benefit was that Sofia indirectly introduced us to the food of her birth country, a beautiful place whose culture and customs we look forward to making a part of our lives from here on in.

Once we knew we were going to adopt a Vietnamese child, I got a few Vietnamese cookbooks and began to discover the cuisine, which I had tried at a handful of restaurants but that I wanted to learn to cook myself. Like Chinese food, it's tricky and time consuming to prepare when you're used to mostly Mediterranean cooking, but I believe it will get easier the more I practice. I found the food there to be more vibrant than the Americanized versions I've had here, laced with fresh, pungent herbs.

The food of north and south Vietnam differs; to describe it quite generally, that of the north has similarities to Chinese but with a lighter touch with the oil, and that of the south is more like Thai cuisine, with more curries, coconut milk and spice. On this trip, we only visited Hanoi, which is in the north, but on our next trip, when we go back to get Sofia, we will also travel to Ho Chi Minh City in the south.

Vietnamese cuisine is one of great depth and complexity of flavor, emphasizing variety of texture and balance of flavor. The sour, salty, sweet, sour, bitter and spicy elements of food all must be in harmony. The ubiquitous, delicious dipping sauce, nuoc cham, is an example of that balance, made with garlic, lime, vinegar, sugar, anchovy sauce and chilies.

Strolling around Hanoi's hot, lively streets, we smelled jasmine and lemongrass and grilled meats. In the shady caverns of the food markets, we inhaled the earthy sweet pungency of dried salty fish and overripe fruit, intriguing and exotic rather than overpowering.

Sometimes, with other adopting parents, we went to elegant restaurants, where live exotic music played, servers swished by us in smiles and silk, and where we dined like kings for about seven or eight dollars per person. But mostly we ate street food at little holes-in-the wall where we crouched our long legs over tiny plastic stools, slurping up aromatic bowlfuls of pho, a rice noodle soup topped with tender slices of beef or chicken, or once, fried baby eels. Two bowls would cost us under a dollar.

Although there are many kinds of soft noodles, rice is central to the cuisine and comes in dozens of varieties. I'm not a big consumer of plain rice, I usually prefer it gussied up in a paella or risotto, but the Vietnamese version is aromatic, fresh tasting and easy to love.

We enjoyed street snacks like banh chung, banana leaves wrapped around steamed sticky rice wrapped around roast pork and specks of scrambled egg. Our more elegant meals were often preceded by scrumptious spring rolls, nem or cha gio, lightly crispy on the outside and filled with crab, pork, tree ears and bean thread (cellophane noodles).

We tried snails with ginger leaves inserted, to flavor as well as help pull out the meat. We had prawns steamed in beer, fish stewed with mushrooms, eel stir-fried with scallions, and my favorite, the rather un-Asian dish of abalone with tiny meaty mushrooms in garlic butter.

We tried pork-stuffed squid, pork in caramel sauce, chicken with lemongrass, and grilled duck perfumed by a bed of sprigs of basil, mint, and cilantro.

There were tangy salads of sweet, crunchy lotus root or chicken and banana flower. We enjoyed the "national vegetable," water spinach, in soup as well as sautéed with garlic or salted bean curd.

We tried plenty of new-to-us fruits, like custard apple with its green exterior and creamy sweet flesh. There were the hairy red rambutans with lichee-like interiors, and tiny, intensely sweet pineapples. My favorite was the dragonfruit, with a mild flavor not as wild as its appearance. From the outside, it looks like a huge red-tinged kohlrabi, and the interior is a gorgeous snowy white speckled with tiny black seeds, all surrounded by a vivid magenta rind. Other sweets we enjoyed were coconut ice cream and a crispy banana fritter.

In Vietnam, the word for beer is conveniently similar to ours, "bia." We tried the cold refreshing bia hoi, which is un-pasteurized and made fresh each day, as well as creamy iced coffee and mild perfumey tea.

We brought home a small bottle of viperine, or snake wine. We have not yet sampled it, and likely won't ever, but it sure creeps out the company.

As a leftover from French colonialism, you can buy wonderful baguettes, pâté and pastries everywhere. In one restaurant I tasted the best omelet I've ever had.

Of course, the tastiest morsel of the trip was our daughter Sofia Grace Kieu Brizzi. The gourmand obsession that usually dogs us on trips anywhere was overshadowed this time by the intense feelings of the long longed-for event of meeting her, and enjoying her sweet, calm personality and beautiful face (alright, alright, I'm a little biased). Since we first heard of her existence on July 23, food for me has been taking a distant second to the joy of at last being a Mom. Soon I'll be tickling her toes instead of garlic cloves, mixing baby food concoctions instead of aioli, and burying my face in her sweet neck instead of the steam of a French lamb stew.

Perhaps my obsession with food will return (I can't imagine ever losing interest in it completely), and one day I'll combine those two great happinesses and teach my daughter to cook.

Jennifer Brizzi | P.O. Box 48 | Rhinecliff, New York 12574 | U.S.A.

jenniferbrizzi@yahoo.com