Off To Vietnam!!

Sunday 27th April, 2014

Last night we went to Vietnam, no, not the country, but the Vietnam Restaurant.  For her birthday Robyn wanted something Asian and so in consultation with the surgeons and anaesthetists that she works with, they recommended this restaurant.

We didn't know what to expect.  They serve a variety of Chinese and Vietnamese food.  This restaurant is so popular they have to have two sittings, the first sitting is from 5.00pm-7.30pm and the second is from 7.30pm -10.00pm.  Robyn opted to go for the first sitting.

We all ordered soup, chicken and asparagus, chicken and mushroom, chicken and corn and crabmeat and corn.  None of us were that impressed.  My soup looked awful and then when they told me that it had egg white floating in it that was the last straw....yuk!!!

By the way I had the chicken and asparagus soup.  For entree we ordered bar-b-qued quail, spring rolls,  pork cold rolls and skewered cane sugar prawns.  Oh my this food was delicious!!  Never ever having eaten quail before I tried some and it was so tasty.  The spring rolls were very nice, but I didn't go much for the pork cold rolls.

BBQ'd Quail

With the skewered cane sugar prawns came a bowl of hot water and a stack of rice papers.  On the serving platter was the minced prawn meat rolled into balls, mint leaves, lettuce leaves, shredded cabbage and vermicelli.  They also gave us a bowl of peanut dipping sauce.

I can now understand why the waitress questioned us as to why we would want the separate pork cold rolls.  She tried to explain to us that the prawn skewers were cold rolls but we didn't realise that we had to make them ourselves.

There is an art into making these cold rolls.  You put the rice paper into the bowl of hot water to soften it but don't leave it sitting on your plate for too long before you put the ingredients in and roll it up.....the paper just sticks and goes like a clear rubbery jelly.

Tony's rolls looked like mine...lol

Thank goodness we had some Asian people at the next table to us and they showed us how it was done.  I don't think anyone else would have eaten mine if they saw the mess I made of them but they were absolutely to die for.  Yum Yum!!  I am going back there just to have them again.

For main course we ordered honey king prawns, king prawns and cashew nuts, curry chicken and I ordered crispy chicken with chilli and ginger.  Who would've thought that you could make chicken chewy.  When I first bit into it it was like eating really tough calamari and that's what I thought they had given me.

I questioned the waitress but she assured me it was chicken and that's the way it's supposed to be.  They coat it in this white salted batter and when cooked the chicken becomes very chewy.  It was not what I expected but the more you ate  it the tastier it became.  Bob liked it.

After eating all that food we were rather full until we spied the table next to us desserts.  After questioning the waitress and telling us that the cone shaped thingies were almond nougat and ice cream how could one resist?  

I ordered the white chocolate and Robyn had the dark chocolate and Bob ordered ice cream with hazelnuts and Bailey's.  Tony was the only good person not to have any but I got him to share mine with me.  Well, those desserts were to die for too.

Can you believe that this flower is made from 3 pieces of carrot with a pea for the middle and stuck onto a piece of celery leaf.

We left just on 7.30 and the queue for the next sitting was already lined up outside.  Apart from the soups, overall the food was excellent. Good choice Robyn!!