Street Surprise
You don't expect to see anyone 'non-Vietnamese looking' flogging food on the streets of Saigon, but that's what I found at 7b Thi Sach in District 1 today. This mini stall, parked in front of a house, sells one dish only - Cari De (Goat Curry) - and is run by a couple of sisters whose relatives "a long time ago" came from India. They speak in Vietnamese, but know Urdu and a smidgen of English. They inherit their Indian looks, and endearing head wobble, although they adhere to strict Vietnamese fashion sense for females and deck themselves out in regulation pyjamas. There are a slew of Indian curry restaurants in Saigon, but this is the first time I've seen the dish sold as streetfood. The pot, just visible above, holds 4 kilos of curry or "enough for 100 customers" one of the sisters told me. She went on to say they serve 500 dishes a day which I find very difficult to believe, but I asked her three times to confirm the number and she repeated it three times. That's a nice little earner for a small street stall with one miniscule table... 500? Hmmm??
The main dish comes with Com Ni (which I understood to mean Ghee-fried rice) and a side dish of spicy aubergine. The curry was decent and a lot better than most of the Indian restaurants in town which all tend to be sauce heavy with the meat cooked separately (At least that's the way they taste and look to me). This pot had clearly been cooked in one batch. The goat, potatoes and sauce found mutual benefit from this method with bags of curry punch packed into each spoonful. That’s not to say it was one of those uncomfortably hot, chilli-drenched arse-shredders – it wasn’t. In comparison, the rice was bland. However, the aubergine was excellent and I didn't sense any threat to my lower internals from this dish either. The sisters told me there’s plenty of passing trade who are happy to stump up 20,000VD for a takeaway. I saw two customers buying grub during my 30-minute lunch stop banter, but no signs of the feeding of the 500. That said - I'll be back. Nice find.
Mosque munchies
The ramshackle rear end of the Central mosque at 66 Dong Du street in District 1 is home to Saigon's hottest halal diner. There's an eclectic clientelle. On any given day you'll find Malaysian expats sidling up next backpackers in birkenstocks, Japanese tourists, a sprinkling of Vietnamese, the odd infidel and a couple of cats. They're all here for one thing, no-nonsense curry. The 'Mosque Restaurant', as it is known, is a fuss-free open air tables and chairs affair more soup kitchen chic than classy curry house.
There are seven curry dishes; including squid, fish, crab, mutton, vegetable and chicken numbers. There's also fried chicken on offer. Your mosque meat comes with turmeric tossed mixed rice, a roti (kind of bread) and a plate of bananas. There's no messing around here, all dishes are delivered to your table immediately. First up is the crab curry pictured above. Not strictly a 'mange tout' crab, I scoffed the lot anyhow. I find neanderthal pleasure in the denture destroying cracks of crab shell. The curry itself, as with all curries I have tried here, is reasonably flavour full, but mild, in a Malaysian manner, and quite greasy.
The chicken curry didn't work quite so well as the moorish crab. The poultry was bit chewy and, to my tastes at least, slightly synthetic. On previous occasions I have had the squid curry, but that also ventured deep into chew territory. The one below was the winner on the day - okra and tomato curry. In fact it was so good, we ordered another one. The mild curry sauce was as near as makes no difference the same as all the other curries we tried. I doubt there is any variation in the spicings and seasonings of the different curries on offer, but I'll be back to check if the chilies lurk elsewhere on another visit.
OK - so you're probably not gonna find the best curry this side of Karachi within these walls, but the 'Mosque Restaurant' is a peaceful pitstop for munchies from the Malaysian peninsular. It's also cheap. Curries go for between 5,000VD and 35,000VD a nod. Lunch for two with four curry plates, rice, bread, iced tea and napkins came to a slim 92,000VD.
http://www.noodlepie.com/blog/curry/index.html
http://www.noodlepie.com/blog/curry/index.html
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