215: Cha Ca La Vong, Hanoi Vietnam from the 1000 places to see before you die book

Could have sworn I posted this...but clearly not. So now to dredge up my memories of a trip 3 months ago with several in between that I know i was meant to write but got caught in more trips!!

Cha Ca is a Vietnamese curried fried fish dish- some would say their national dish. I was rather amused to hear that restaurant critic AA Gill put Cha Ca as one of the best ways to start breakfast...mmm...not sure about that. Id eat congi or Vegemite under scrambled eggs for breakfast any day....but buttery fried fish.......

And if fried fish wasnt enough- it turns out that Fried  Fish Restaurant serving Fried Fish is on Fried Fish street- yes Cha Ca La Vong restaurant- that serves only Cha Ca-  is on Cha Ca street!! Thats pretty much tantamount to painting yourself in green and yellow and eating a vegemite sandwich while singing "I come from the land down under" on Vegemite Street.

Wonder if there is such a thing as Vegemite Street?

Well a web search says there is a street named after vegemite-  Theodore St in Canberra- which is named after Cyril Callister, the Chief Chemist of Kraft Walker Cheese Company which still produces Vegemite. I hear you asking for help connecting the dots there. Well not even askJeeves could help on connecting Theodore with Cyril, bar one hit for Teddy Roosevelt and vegemite without any explanation.   Given Obama took a swipe at Vegemite recently proclaiming it "horrible", I can imagine that Kraft doesnt need the publicity of the views of two Presidents of USA.

Certainly Cyril did develop the spread per his boss's request to utilise one of the richest known natural vitamin B sources - brewer’s yeast- which was a discarded product at the time.   And so vegemite was launched to millions of future happy little Vegemites in 1927. While no street appears to be directly named after Australia's favourite...spread? seasoning? soup base? gravy base, it is true that the first scanned product in a supermarket was Vegemite, that some 22 million jars are sold every year and I have kissed Vegemite Rock- which exists in a little seaside suburb of Melbourne opposite where the factory was originally located.

I digress- Cha Ca (could follow anotherlate night Australian angle now and think of that little feathered dancing granny from the Amazon on Clive James Late night show at this stage) but let me stick with garoupa fish- which is what is in Cha Ca.  Boiled or fried in some oily substance, you take your noodles, add the fish then add various additions in front of you such as peanuts, pickled vegetables and various sauces. It was nice.....like any fish cooked in a heavy butter sauce would be...but would I put it in the "1000 places to see before you die" book??



Page rip out on this one Im afraid. The restaurant is no different to thousands in Vietnam..that means cheap furniture, gaudy colours and an abundance of plastic flowers.



The dish- well its a bit like putting a hole in a wall in some back street in Edinburgh, selling deep fried mars bars from it and getting it featured in the 1000 places to see before you die book.

Ill pass!

208: Patrick Guilbaud Restaurant Dublin, Ireland

Definately deserves a ranking- restaurant patrick guilbaud- is all that its website says..........................."combining contemporary elegance with an intimate ambience and unparalleled service."  Patrick Guilbaud’s family is from Cognac but, after a brief stint in England he moved to Ireland to open his own restaurant...in the process...obtaining a few Michelin stars.



The food was exquisite....

The wine list not so....well at least- not from the point of view of its size....all too hard so we asked the sommelier to pair our food up as we went- which was wonderful!!  Extremely generous servings of the plonk with some very unusual choices- in fact we asked for two labels from an unusual white and red wine that we tried as both were lovely.

We were in the mood to relax and chat rather than pore over the exhaustive food and wine menu so we went for a "chef's surprise." After finding out what we liked or disliked the chef went to work serving us up a 5 course little treat....

which amazingly even saw me eating...and loving..fish- cod!

Fantastic. Service was great, food was truly amazing, wine pairing was interesting and a revelation. The bill...well circa 450 euros for 3 of us which given the gluttony at the table I felt was good value

Rodizio and Feijoada in Rio: Number 186 of the 1000 places to see before you die

This is all about food, glorious food. So……first on the rank- rodizio which means “rotation” This style is about lots of waiters walking around with a piece of cooked meat carving it directly to your plate. Add a buffet of seafood, salads, breads, desserts and soup…its basically an upmarket BBQ (churrascarai given we are in Brazil) delivered straight to your plate.

the restaurant



My night to experience this was at a restaurant called Porcao , aptly meaning “big pig” which first started slicing up the meat in Rio in 1975 and now has locations in Italy, Switzerland, Germany, France, Portugal, and the United States.

Suffice to say, the style makes you one big pig. While only a few slivers of each meat is delivered there were about 10 skewers with hunks of sirloin through to brisket circulating at any one time. You are given a disc when you arrive which is basically a “yes……feed me” sign in green and a “no…im full” in red. At this stage of the night I was a green sign.

Divine!!  

Now for the next- feijoada. Not for the fainthearted this is a Saturday delicacy. So off I trooped to the recommended Caesar Park Hotel in Ipanema, Rio to try this. I was rather lucky that it was the weekend before Carneval so the hotel had put on a special Carneval Feijoada lunch- not cheap at some $200- but it came with one of the top Samba schools dancing- full on band, samba girls and boys, the owner (and his son) and their flag bearer, unlimited caipirinhas, school t-shirt and a few feathers. Beija-Flor Samba school was hotly tipped to be one of the leading contenders at the forthcoming Carneval- and in fact went on that week to win top spot at the 2011 Carneval.


the owner, son and leading flag carrier



But first- to review feijoada. Now this Brazilian national dish is a black bean stew with pork and beef, which originates from Portugal. At the hotel they had big earthenware pots containing the beans….then…get ready….equally as large pots of pigs ears, tripe, smoked sausage, unsmoked sausage, pigs tail, beef tongue, pork loin, pork cutlet, beef, dried beef and trotters. You mixed and matched as you felt free.

While a novelty, this is not a gourmet looking dish- the beans are black, all of the meat stews are brown, and then there is white rice or yellow cassava flour to put on the base. Presentation and flavour (other than that overwhelmingly of meat) is not in feijoada’s favour.

I forgot as it was to take a photo of it all on my plate because at that moment out came a samba girl and boy…..and this was more of a highlight…


So, both reviewed. Should they be in the top 1000 places to see before you die?

I have to say a thumbs down on this. While they may well represent the national dish, and a Brazilian way of eating….none the less paella in spain doesn’t appear in the book, neither does vegemite and cheese sandwich on bondi beach (personally Id put that in the 1000 things people should experience) so I think that you shouldn’t lose any sleep if this was one of the things that you went to your deathbed without experiencing!

However....samba boys and girls should be in there....but then Carneval Rio is my next blog!

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Place 165 - Joe's Stone Crab, Miami Beach

It was a rather rushed day. Id given myself a 6 hour lay over in Miami to nip out and see a few things in the 1000 places to see before you die book. After going on a nice walk down South Beach, a detour to the new Soho House Miami (fabulous!), I went in search of lunch at Joe's Stone Crab, one of the 1000 places.

Joe's was opened as a small lunch counter in 1913 serving largely fish and chips. In 1921, as a result of a chance largely when one of the founder's friends built an aquarium at the foot of the Bay and 5th Street, a researcher brought along some stone crabs from the Bay to cook for lunch. And that was it-

Anyhow, at first it was a bit confusing. It seems it has expanded into two restaurants only one of which was open. There is one counter which is a takeaway - albeit set out in a very top end takeaway style with fresh salads, fish and trays and trays of stone crab.

On the other a sit down restuarant with a counter bar- which is where I sat myself down to a treat of medium stone crabs with slaw and fries. And it was good. Very good. But then I love crab!!
from seventy-five cents for four or five crabs, twenty-five cents for potatoes and twenty-five cents an order for coleslaw in 1921 they have progressed to about US$40 per four or five crabs and $7 for potatoes . Fedexed daily anywhere in America and, allegedly, a staunch favourite of J Lo and Madonna, Joe's Stone Crabs has become a firm family and celebrity favourite.

Now, everyone likes a home grown success story. Especially when it involves immigrants making it good in the US of A . A story of using something that was plentiful in the local surroundings but which no one before had thought to eat. A family that created a business that became succesful enough to provide a great living for fellow descendents. And dont get me wrong- the crab was also very good.

But I have to admit, Im failing to understand why this restaurant was selected in the 1000 places to see before you die. I mean its a nice, family run, quaint, cute and very clean, upmarket, well marketed takeaway.....of crabs.

But Im failing to see if I would travel to come and see this place. And that is what the 1000 places is all about I thought. I can think of quite a few restaurants Id travel to - Noma in Denmark, El Bulli in Spain when it re-opens, Fat Duck in England every quarter when they changed their menu, none of which feature in the 1000 places to see before you die.
For this reason...Im going to find....or not....a replacement entry for Miami in the 1000 places...let the hunt begin