It helps to be obsessed by a single dish when you arrive in Saigon. I usually hit up a few of my favourite restaurants (the upmarket street food specialist Quan An Ngon, commercial pho franchise Pho 24 anywhere about town) and then am lost in a sea of choice. There’s bun of almost limitless variety, multitude variations on pho, and street food on every corner and clinging to each alleyway. I negotiate these choices by getting momentarily obsessed with seeking out a single dish and then moving on. I felt like thit nuong: casing-free Vietnamese pork sausage, served with the rice noodle bun or in the ultimate Vietnamese sandwich as banh thit nuong; and with this idea for a dish as organising principle, I hit the streets for some local charred charcuterie action.
In the basement of the mall-like Andong market in Cholon is a small concentration of thit nuong vendors, along with the normal assortment of dehydrated animal stalls. I picked the thit nuong vendor that both had the more impressive charred sausage display and laughed the most at me. I’m not really that funny.
Bun thit nuong cha gio
The sausage was garlicky and sweetly caramelised, the rest was light on the herbage and bean sprouts but topped with crushed peanuts aplenty. Now, to find a new obsession.
Price: 14,000 VND
Damn you, you just made me extremely hungry.
You’ve made me very hungry too! Absolutely love the blog! I’m going to link to you and subscribe. Wonderful stuff!
I just found you, the bahn thit nuong sound amazing! I am going to try to head down to Andong Market in the next couple days to hit it up. brilliant!
Slavodelic – it’s well worth the trip. Make sure to hit Binh Tay Market while you’re in the general vicinity.
This looks excellent, but one clarification. “Thit” means meat and “nuong” is grilled. So “thit nuong” could be any grilled meat. The casing-free pork sausage you’re referring to looks more specifically like “nem nuong”.
You rock, love your blog xoxoxo