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Hanoi Vietnam.

2 flights and 20 plus hours of traveling.

I’m a long way from New York City but it’s a warm late December morning in North Vietnam, and I’m just fine with that. I’m a little confused about the time change… Can it really be that I haven’t eaten for 2 days??!  Not sure, but I am hungry and that’s not up for debate.

This is not a travel piece, and I am not a travel writer. I am a culinary student and I’m in Vietnam. And I packed light. All I brought was my camera and my appetite.

This was my first meal in Vietnam. Cha ca fish. I was starving and would have eaten just about anything at this point, except cottage cheese – can’t stand the stuff. That said I enjoyed meal but little did I know that I would find this fish just around about any corner in Vietnam.

The ubiquitous Cha ca fish- part catfish, part bass. It’s a firm, round white-fleshed fish, that tastes just a little bit tough and fishy. The consensus at the end of the meal was that fresh herbs, greens and toasted peanuts were the winners.

I was pleasantly surprised when I found the same fresh herbs (basil, thai basil and coriander) accompanying my next meal (which was about an hour later).

Bun Cha (above) is my personal favorite.

It’s something I could eat at any meal of the day or, for that matter, every meal of the day. Bun Cha is a luke warm fish broth with cold rice noodles served with fat bits of meat (either pork or beef or other) or sometimes fried egg rolls, garnished with fresh herbs, soy beans, toasted peanuts and finished with chili sauce. If you are particularly fortunate, your Bun Cha will be served with a cold local beer called Bia Hoi and prepared by the lady seen above.

Bun Cha is an anomaly. A hearty, savory dish that is both unctuous and refreshing. Maybe this is because it is a fish soup served neither hot nor chilled, but at room temperature. One would think: Its definitely a fish soup, isn’t it? But the trick is, while it has a fish broth and fish sauce, the floating bits of protein in the broth are beef.

A better way to think about Bun Cha may be as a wet salad as opposed to a tepid soup. The raw greens, cold noodles, and cold meat are reminiscent of an Asian beef salad, something about as common as a rat in the subway, and in my opinion not much more appealing. But don’t get me wrong, Bun Cha – I’m a big fan of yours. The difference is the fish sauce. Vietnamese fish sauce come in two versions: non-fermented and fermented. Both are sweet and tangy but the latter has a smell similar to a men’s locker room.

After 48 hours in Hanoi, I hit Halong Bay. It’s beautiful. It should be one of the 7 wonders of the world. But it’s not, so there is a huge promotional campaign to have it included in the “next” 7 wonders of the world. I hope it works out.

Halong Bay has over 2000 limestone hills that seemingly just pop out of the water. It’s incredible. If you want to hear more about it, see pictures in a Lonely Planet guide or something…

Within these 2000 or so islands there are fully functioning communities, complete with their own stores, markets, even bars.

I decided to stop by one of these villages to pick-up some food for a simple lunch of fresh local fish. Who am I kidding? That was never going to happen. Things got out of hand pretty quickly and I had a full-on shellfish orgy on my hands.,

Here are a couple “before” pictures from lunch- a big-ass octopus and crayfish-looking shrimp straight from the bay.

Lunch wasn’t bad. The shrimp were steamed in vinegar and green onions and the octopus was steamed as well but in beer and red chillies. Both were served with fish sauce, but fortunately it was of the non-fermented variety. Otherwise lunch would have smelled like a wet gym-sock.

On the left is the octopus steamed in beer and chillies accompanied by the fish sauce. On the right are 2 different types of crabs that were pulled out of the bay less then an hour before they ended up on this plate and then in my belly.

On the left: the fish-monger called it a carp. But I knew better, once again the ubiquitous cha ca fish, this time fried and stuffed with tomatoes, peppers, and onions. As for the photo on the right, like I said: I enjoyed myself. Let’s leave it at that.

From Halong Bay it was time to head south and hit Saigon, the largest city in the country for a day visit.

Saigon is a big city with lots of motorbikes. About 4 million of them, so the air quality was not great, but the city more than made up for that with its gastronomic offerings. While in Saigon I ate everywhere from the gnarly (and I mean it in both the good and the bad ways) stalls in the markets (below [fish stand, roast pork, and random parts] yum) to a classic French restaurant where I was able to enjoy a traditional 5 course lunch of smoked salmon, foie gras, truffles, maigret de canard, and venison. The chef was from Nice and didn’t speak any English or Vietnamese. I may have been in Vietnam but in his house it was France, France and more France.

I enjoyed my classic French meal rich with the flavor of nostalgia, for what now feels like an ancient colonialism. The lesson I took away from this meal was that imperialism, like most other things French, tastes better in France.

During my brief stay in Vietnam I also had the chance to try some of what the hotel concierge called the “new Vietnamese haute cuisine.” It was good; I enjoyed it. But it was basically just better quality versions of the staples such as spring rolls, seafood pancakes, and the like. I really enjoyed this meal and I am going to choose not to be critical. Why? South Vietnam as we know it today is basically a completely new country. It was entirely destroyed less then 50 years ago and has only been open to trade with the United States since the mid-1990s.

I say give it time. With the quality of produce that is available in Vietnam and the ever-increasing influx of western cultural influences, there is a bright future for high-end Vietnamese cuisine.

That said the most memorable thing I ate in Saigon was Pho (below).

Pho is a large noodle soup served hot with beef or pork, and clear rice noodles, in a broth of unknown or secret origin. Like Bun Cha (and Cao La in some parts) the Pho is also topped with fresh herbs and served with fish sauce and chili sauce.

My final thoughts on Vietnam; I came in with high expectations and was a little disappointed to find that the cuisine did not vary regionally as much as I had anticipated.

But I arrived hungry and left full so the food couldn’t have been that bad.

Sauce Béarnaise Image via Wikipedia

Where was it that I left off?

That’s right, I was a week into culinary school and I could not yet legitimately claim to have cooked anything.

I may like my steak rare, vegetables crisp, and fish “pink on the bone,” but I’m not an impatient person, which turns out to be a positive because it would be another two weeks before it was time to put some things on the heat.

In the meantime, I think we fabricated (breaking down from primal stages to retail cuts) just about every type of protein. Not really… just the usually suspects: beef, veal, lamb, chicken, duck, rabbit (not my favorite tasting like gamey chicken), some fish, and some shellfish.

By the third week of class it was finally time to get that stainless steel on the burners. It began with stocks then sauces, and at last soups.

In the butter-cream-egg yolk league the sauces were a bonafide all-star team. Hollandaise, béarnaise, beure blanc, béchamel, allemande, mornay, and soubise, and even forestiere. Of course, one cannot forget forestiere. It was a veloute and slurry-filled cholesterol marathon, but I’m better for it. Especially if Le Grenouille comes knockin’ on the door; apparently these sauces have, for all intensive purposes, been relegated to the sauce equivalent of Madam Tussauds. Our arteries can thank the sauce gods that someone somewhere in France invented pan sauces, some time in the 1960’s… probably.

Next up were contemporary sauces, which our Chef instructor said were very popular in the 1990s. I guess by that standard the sauces were more “modern” then “contemporary.”

Finally, with our first final on the horizon, there was soup. Cream of this, bisque of that, my heart in more ways then one longed (ached!) for my mother’s chicken soup!

My first module of culinary school was about to end, and I had certainly learned a thing or two about food, which I had expected but what I learned about myself was a surprise.

I knew I liked my vegetables to taste like vegetables. I also like butter, cream, and salt, but in this case 1+1 does not equal 2. Lighter can mean richer in flavor if authenticity is what you are after. With that said here is a classic heart stopping Béarnaise recipe that is bound to impress!

Shallots (minced), 2 teaspoons

Salt 1 teaspoon

Black pepper, 1 teaspoon

Tarragon, dried 2 teaspoon

Tarragon vinegar, 2 tablespoons

White wine, 2 tablespoons

Water 1.5 fl oz

Egg yolks, 3

Clarified butter, 4 fl oz

Tarragon leaves (chopped), 1 teaspoon.

Combine shallots, pepper, salt, dried tarragon, vinegar, wine. In a saucepan reduce till almost dry and water and let cool. Combine reduction with egg yolks and wisk over a cold-water bath. Whisk in clarified butter. Strain. Add tarragon leaves and adjust seasoning

Image via Wikipedia

I think the general perception of culinary school is something along collegial academia meets “Top Chef.”

Well guess what?

It’s slightly less glamorous… Sure things may change once the class’ skill level improves, the recipes get more complicated, and grades, even jobs are at stake… but right now I’m four hours into a sanitation lecture and that seems a long way off.

“SANITATION IS NOT AN OPTION,” excellent, lesson learned now can I have those eight hours of my life back?

Its day 3 and things are looking-up. Food is finally in front of us. An endless stack of Idaho potatoes, waiting to be medium diced. It’s the end of the day and my perfect little cubes are not so perfect, and certainly not cubes.

I diced potatoes, minced shallots, and diced, sliced (and everything in between) onions, don’t let me forget peppers, celery, cabbage.

And I will never be the same.

Imagine one morning a complete stranger walks into your bedroom as you are putting on your shoes, about to leave the house and explains that you are not going anywhere until he shows you how to walk.

I know it hard to imagine- but humor me…

There will be no walking at all, until you can demonstrate that you can walk as he has just taught you.

Well, we have all cut vegetables before, loads probably, but there was a case of potatoes (and other vegetable friends) in front of me and I was not going anywhere until I could chop them the way Chef said to.

This objective was not as simple to achieve as one might imagine. I submit my cut and bandaged left hand has evidence. At one point Chef pointed out that I better learn to move my left hand out of the way, or pretty soon I was going to be more blood than flesh…

Finally, before I leave you with a recipe from my first week at school (and trust me it’s a winner), I want to open the discussion to a subject that I will continually address throughout the future of this column. Our connection to our food source. And this does not refer to whether or not food is organic, local, or even healthy.

To put it another way, salad comes from the ground, not a plastic bag, chickens are more then disembodied breasts, and no fruit or vegetable (no matter how popular) grows all year long.

I hope that by offering many examples of the growing disconnect between humans and their food, it will become more apparent that there are many facets to this issue and it effects all of us in between (and even beyond) the Berkshire Mountains and the Napa Valley.

COMING UP NEXT WEEK: Dead Meat: Fabricating Meat, poultry, fish, and shellfish

RECIPE FOR WEEK 1: Mashed Potatoes

INGREDIENTS

1 1/2 lbs Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and quartered length-wise

1/2 teaspoon salt

4 Tbsp heavy cream

2 Tbsp butter

1 Tbsp milk

Salt and Pepper to taste

METHOD

1 Peel Potatoes

2.Blanche potatoes in a large pot. Add 1/2-teaspoon salt. Add water until potatoes are covered. Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer, covered, 15-20 minutes, or until done – a fork can easily be poked through them.

3 Warm milk and melt butter, together (80% to 20%), with 2 cloves of garlic, 2 sprigs of thyme, and 1 sprig of rosemary, in a saucepan on the stove. 4.Drain water from potatoes. Put hot potatoes into a ricer. Then add to bowl cream and melted butter mixture. Mix with a heavy spoon. Salt and pepper to taste Serves 4.

Sam K. Simon is a natural-born gourmet. He is currently enrolled in the Culinary Arts Diploma Program at the Institute of Culinary Education in New York City