9 FEATURES WHICH YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT HANOI STREET FOOD TOUR CULTURE

[Tống Hồng Phong]

   Hanoi street food is very diverse, delicious and healthy gastronomies in the world. The main ingredients used in Vietnamese food are rice and its derivatives, vegetables and fish sauce. There are hundreds of recipes to make Vietnamese foods but I will introduce you 9 mainly features  Hanoi Street Food Tour 

1.    Combination with different cuisines 

        Vietnamese people easily learn cuisines from different minorities or countries and  combine them with Vietnamese cuisine, create them to become Vietnamese foods as well as make them become more suitable with Vietnamese taste. Eating wholly: People eat by their eyes so Vietnamese food has to be colorful and diversity. After looking the food, they taste them by their nose. They smell flavors emitted from ingredients. Then they use their tooth to touch and try the food taste. Then through the ears, they hear when they are chewing food. They enjoy Hanoi Street Food by using all of senses which is called “eating wholly”.

2.    Healthy and less fatty

    Almost of Vietnamese foods are made from vegetables, bulbs, fruits, etc so less fatty and we don’t use much meat and oil as different cuisines such as western food or Chinese food.

3.    Very tasty with a lot of flavors

   Vietnamese people usually cook their foods with fish sauce and different spices so their food is very tasty. Each dish will have different dipping sauce which can be made from fish sauce, soy sauce, etc to make the dish more delicious. 

4.    Perfect combination between a lot of spices and ingredients

   Vietnamese cuisine includes many different ingredients such as meat, shrimp, crab, vegetables, bean, etc and combine between different flavors: sour, spicy, salty, sweet, etc.

5.    Delicious, healthy and easy to eat

   Vietnamese people consider cooking the food which belong to Yin and Yang is healthy. Generally, the salty food belongs to Yang and the sour and sweet one belongs to Yin. In the process of cooking, they mix the Yin and Yang together. For example, Duck meat or snail are Yang food so we should eat them with Ying food such as ginger or Vietnamese cilantro, etc. It’s the way to balance Ying and Yang. It’s interesting and unique.

6.    Using chopsticks 

   Using chopstick is a challenge with foreign tourists especially westerners who never use chopstick before. You have to be very skillful to use them, don’t drop any food or pick the food carefully. Vietnamese always eat with chopsticks, we rarely use folk or knife as westerners. It’s not really hard to use chopsticks for beginners, you just learn how to use them for some minutes and then you can enjoy our Vietnamese food.

7.    Community eating

   On the dining table, cooked rice, soup and fish sauce are shared to everyone. Everyone has own bowl. You can eat whatever they want, eat very little or very much which depends on their digestion. In every meals, we always have a sauce to eat with. They can be fish sauce (more common), soy sauce, shrimp paste, etc. There is one thing for sure that fish sauce contributes a great culture feature in Hanoi Street Food Tour

8.    Hospitality

    In Street Food Tour in Hanoi , at the beginning of the meal, the children will arrange chopsticks for their parents, their grandparents or adults and then invite their grandparents and parents to eat first. It’s the way to express the respectability for someone who older than you and for their members in a family. .
Vietnamese people are hospitality. We like inviting friends, relationships to have meal together or if you visit their home while they’re eating, they’re happy to invite you to have meal with them. It’s a beautiful and significant culture in Vietnam

9.    Serving foods in a tray

    There are no transparent meal portions among Vietnam family members in a meal and they must consider thoughtfully how much they should eat since all the food together is put in a tray. In the center of the tray, there goes the renowned fish sauce bowl which is used by all the eaters and supposed to form Vietnamese characteristics. Some says that the common fish sauce bowl represents Vietnamese solidarity, yet some others say the bowl is the root of many bad personalities such as jealousy and embezzlement. We serve every dish in the tray from main dishes to dessert.