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I Sat on Tiny Plastic Chairs in Vietnam and Can't Stop Chasing That Food
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items Something broke in my brain after eating pho on a sidewalk in Saigon at 6am surrounded by motorbikes and strangers — every restaurant meal back home felt wrong after that. If you're planning a Vietnam trip or just came back and want to recreate those...
Sections
10
Tiny Chairs and Street Food Setup at Home
Pho Broth That Doesn't Take 12 Hours
Rice Noodles Worth Slurping
Sauces and Condiments That Actually Taste Right
Bánh Mì Ingredients I Keep Stocked
Pickled Vegetables and Fresh Herbs
Tiny Chairs and Street Food Setup at Home
My kitchen island looked nothing like a Hanoi street corner, but I got weirdly close. These let me recreate that low-to-the-ground, bowls-everywhere, no-pretense eating vibe for weekend pho mornings.
Grab a couple of these in red — they're almost the exact height of those Vietnamese street stools. Had friends over for bún bò Huế and everyone sat on these in the backyard. Ridiculous? Yes. Did it feel right? Absolutely.
MAMMUT children's stool, in/outdoor/white
Use this instead of regular soup bowls — the wide rim lets you rest chopsticks and a spoon without everything sliding into the broth. Perfect for anyone who's tired of fishing their spoon out of hot liquid.
Kinto Ceramic Lab Bowl / Black
Ditch your regular spoons for pho night. These flat-bottom Asian soup spoons hold just the right ratio of broth to noodle. Kept burning my lip with deep spoons before switching to these.
HIC Harold Import Co. HIC Chinese Soup Spoon, 1 EA
Toss all your herbs, lime wedges, and chili on this and pass it around. Beats the sad plate-of-garnishes situation I had going before — now it actually looks like a proper Vietnamese spread.
Totally Bamboo Butler's Serving Tray with Handles
Pho Broth That Doesn't Take 12 Hours
Spent one entire Sunday babysitting a stockpot and my apartment smelled like star anise for a week. These shortcuts get you 90% there without losing a whole day.
Keep a jar of this in the fridge at all times. When it's Tuesday and you want pho but definitely aren't roasting bones — two spoonfuls in hot water and you're eating in 20 minutes. For anyone who craves pho more than they have patience.
Cốt Phở Bò Beef Pho Soup Base 48 Ounces
Toast three of these in a dry pan for 30 seconds and drop them in store-bought broth — the smell alone transports you back to that street corner. Wish someone told me this trick two years ago.
Frontier Co-op Star Anise, Whole, Organic, Select-Grade 1 lb.
Swap your stockpot for this if you want real bone broth in 2 hours instead of 12. Threw in beef knuckles, charred onion, and spices before work — came home to broth that tasted like Saigon.
Instant Pot Duo 6 Qt 7-in-1 Pressure Cooker
Try this for chicken pho when you want something lighter. My Vietnamese neighbor laughed when she saw me struggling with homemade broth and handed me this. She was right — it's genuinely good.
Bao Long Mini Pho Soup Seasoning (Chicken Flavor)
Rice Noodles Worth Slurping
Rubbery, clumpy noodles ruined my first five attempts at home pho. Turns out the noodle matters way more than I gave it credit for.
Soak these in room temp water for 30 minutes, then blanch for 10 seconds — that's it. Took me burning through three other brands to land here. For anyone whose noodles keep turning to mush.
Three Ladies Vietnamese Rice Vermicelli Bun Tuoi 454g.
Snag a pack for those nights when you want pho but can't even boil water properly. It's instant, yes, but it's the instant that Vietnamese people actually eat. No shame in the quick bowl.
Acecook Oh! Ricey Instant Pho Rice Noodles
Switch things up with these thick tapioca noodles — they're chewy and slippery and completely different from regular pho noodles. Great if you ate bánh canh cua in Vietnam and have been chasing it since.
Bamboo Tree Rice Noodles Banh Pho L 5mm 30x400g
Use these round, thick noodles specifically for spicy Huế-style soup. Regular pho noodles are too thin and get lost in that beefy lemongrass broth — these hold their own.
BBH — Bún Bò Huế, aka Vietnam's most popular spicy beef
Sauces and Condiments That Actually Taste Right
Sriracha is fine but it's not what's on the table in Vietnam. Took me a while to figure out which bottles match what I actually tasted over there.
Ditch the squeeze-bottle sriracha for this chunky chili paste — it's closer to what you get handed on the street. Drop a spoonful into your broth and stir. Raw garlic bite, real chili heat, no sweetness.
Huy Fong Sambal Oelek Ground Fresh Chili Paste
Grab this specific bottle — it's the one Vietnamese home cooks actually reach for. Tried four other fish sauces first and they all tasted like a fish market instead of that balanced, salty-sweet magic.
Fish Sauces Compared
Keep this next to your pho bowl for dipping meat. A little goes a long way — my mistake was drowning everything in it the first time. For anyone who wants that sweet-savory hit without overpowering the broth.
Lee Kum Kee (LKK)
Try this if you want the exact red chili sauce sitting in the metal caddy at every street stall. Slightly sweet, garlicky, and it doesn't blow your head off. Stock up — the small jars disappear fast.
The Hirshon Guilin Chili Sauce - 桂林辣椒酱
Bánh Mì Ingredients I Keep Stocked
Paid $16 for a mediocre bánh mì in Brooklyn and decided I'd rather just make my own. Once you nail the bread, everything else falls into place.
Find an Asian bakery near you — their baguettes are lighter and crispier than French ones, which is the whole point. Gonnella makes a similar style if you're nowhere near an Asian market. The bread is 70% of the sandwich.
Gonnella Baking Co.
Slice this thin and layer it with pâté — that combo is what makes a classic bánh mì thịt. Tried making my own once and it was a disaster. Just buy the real thing from a Vietnamese brand.
Roxy Trading Inc -Pacific Rim specialty Food Importers
Spread a thin layer on the bread before anything else. People skip this step and wonder why their bánh mì tastes flat. It's the umami backbone — don't leave it out.
Easy, Homemade Pork Liver Pâté Recipe
Use this instead of regular mayo — it's richer, tangier, and has that specific flavor you tasted in Vietnam but couldn't place. Squeeze it on the bread opposite the pâté side. You'll never go back to Hellmann's for sandwiches.
Japanese Kewpie Mayonnaise Recipe
Pickled Vegetables and Fresh Herbs
A bowl of pho without a mountain of herbs is just soup. And bánh mì without đồ chua is just a sandwich. These are the things that make Vietnamese food feel alive.
Julienne this with carrots, toss in rice vinegar and sugar, wait an hour. That's đồ chua — the pink crunchy pickle on every bánh mì. Took me three trips to Vietnam before I realized how simple it was to make.
Organic Daikon Radish | Grocery Pickup & Delivery
Grow your own — seriously. Buying those sad plastic clamshells every week adds up and half of it wilts before you use it. One potted Thai basil plant kept me in herbs for four months straight.
Thai Basil Plant
Toss these in a pot on your windowsill if you miss that peppery herb from street food stalls. Most grocery stores don't carry it, so growing your own is the move. Tastes nothing like regular cilantro.
Set of 5 Vietnamese Herb Seeds 1000+ Seeds
Keep this around for quick pickles and dipping sauces. It's already lightly sweetened so you skip the step of dissolving sugar. Perfect for anyone who wants đồ chua ready in 30 minutes instead of overnight.
Seasoned Gourmet Rice Vinegar
Vietnamese Coffee That Hits Different
Ordered a cà phê sữa đá at a street cart in Saigon and it genuinely changed how I think about coffee. Dark, intense, sweet — nothing like what I was drinking at home.
Brew this strong and pour it over ice with sweetened condensed milk — that's the real deal. Switched from my usual medium roast and the chocolatey, almost smoky flavor is what I'd been missing for two years.
Ground coffee Trung Nguyen CREATIVE 3 250g
Use this little metal dripper instead of your pour-over — the slow drip is the whole ritual. Set it on your cup, add hot water, wait four minutes. For anyone who wants to slow down their mornings without buying a $300 machine.
Traditional Reusable Inox Phin Coffee Filter
Pour two tablespoons into your glass before the coffee drips in. This is the brand you'll see in most Vietnamese kitchens — it's sweeter and thicker than Eagle Brand. Don't skip it or your iced coffee will taste like regular cold brew.
Longevity Full Cream Sweetened Condensed Milk
Snag this for making big batches of Vietnamese cold brew overnight. Coarse-grind the Trung Nguyen, fill the bottle, fridge it for 12 hours. Woke up to ready-made concentrate every morning for a week — felt like I had my own street cart.
MIZUDASHI (Cold Brew) Coffee Pot
Cooking Tools That Match How Street Vendors Actually Cook
Watched a woman in Hanoi cook bún chả over charcoal in a tin can and realized I was overcomplicating everything with my fancy kitchen setup.
Get a carbon steel wok and season it properly — nonstick pans can't give you that smoky wok hei flavor. Stir-fried morning glory in this and it tasted like the plate I had in Hội An for the first time. Worth the 20-minute seasoning process.
JOYCE CHEN Classic Series 14-Inch Uncoated Carbon
Use this for bún chả — the small size concentrates the heat and you get those charred edges on the pork patties. Dragged it onto my apartment balcony and grilled like I was on a Hanoi sidewalk. Neighbors were curious, then jealous.
Weber Smokey Joe 14-Inch Portable Grill
Pound your own garlic-chili paste instead of using a blender — the texture is completely different, chunkier and more aromatic. My nước chấm went from okay to addictive once I started crushing ingredients by hand.
7 Inch Thai Granite Mortar and Pestle
Swap your knife skills for this when you need paper-thin green papaya or carrot shreds. Tried hand-cutting for a gỏi salad and it took 40 minutes. This does it in 3. Watch your fingers though — learned that the painful way.
3D Slicer image computing platform | 3D Slicer
Cookbooks and Resources That Taught Me the Most
YouTube rabbit holes only got me so far. These gave me the context behind the food — why things are cooked a certain way, not just how.
Start here if you've never cooked Vietnamese food at home. Andrea doesn't assume you have access to a specialty store — she tells you what to sub and what to skip. Made her everyday pho recipe on a Wednesday and it actually worked.
Vietnamese Food Any Day — Recent Stories
Grab this once you're ready to go deeper on broth. She breaks down regional differences — northern vs. southern pho — and it finally explained why my homemade version never tasted like what I had in Hanoi vs. Saigon.
Testing Out Andrea Nguyen's Pho Cookbook
Read this for the why behind the food, not recipes. Understanding French colonial influence on bánh mì and Chinese influence on phở made every dish more interesting. For the person who eats with their brain as much as their mouth.
Rice and Baguette: A History of Food in Vietnam
Watch his Vietnam street food series before your trip or when you're homesick for Saigon. He eats with such genuine joy that you'll add 15 things to your must-try list. Showed his Bún Mắm video to my partner and we booked flights that week.
Mark Wiens
Travel Gear for Eating Your Way Through Vietnam
Packed wrong on my first trip and spent half of it sweating through cotton shirts while hunched over steaming bowls. These fixed every comfort problem I had.
Wear these in Vietnamese humidity and you'll understand — regular cotton underwear becomes a swamp situation by 10am. These dry fast, don't smell, and I packed three pairs for two weeks. For anyone heading to Southeast Asia in summer.
Men's Give-N-Go® 2.0 Underwear Collection
Bring this so you can drink tap water anywhere without buying plastic bottles every hour. Filled it from hotel sinks, street taps, wherever — zero stomach issues across three weeks. Pays for itself in two days of not buying bottled water.
GRAYL GeoPress 24oz Water Purifier & Filter
Toss your phone, cash, and water bottle in this and walk for hours through markets without a bulky backpack. Small enough that you're not knocking over someone's noodle cart when you squeeze past. Wore it every single day.
Daylite™ Sling
Dunk this in water, wring it, drape it on your neck — instant relief when you're sitting on a plastic chair in 95°F heat waiting for your cơm tấm. Looked silly but felt incredible. Wish I'd packed it on trip one instead of trip three.
FROGG TOGGS Chilly Pad, Instant Cooling Towel