This post is from my last adventure and I had intended to post over Christmas but you know how it is with intentions over Christmas so I’m updating in Abu Dhabi en route to Sri Lanka…..
This one is for my foodie friends – you know who you are! And the good news is this is not going to be a rant about getting a good cup of tea… that continues to be a bit of a nightmare.. although in fairness it wasn’t too bad in Nepal and it was hot but pissy in Cambodia. Bhutan was also pissy but again if you got the right person you got a hot cup.. ok ok sorry this post is NOT about tea it’s about the all the yummy delicious food we tried…
NEPAL:
For our first meal in Nepal we threw ourselves straight into a traditional Newari meal. The restaurant was called Bhojan Griha and it was a set menu of about 6 courses, starting with popcorn (yep popcorn!) it and included a curry, momo and lots of vegetables – it was very tasty. We sat on cushions, traditional style and were entertained by a band and dancers.
The only thing I didn’t like was the rice wine poured in this crazy fashion :
One thing I wasn’t mad about was that everywhere you ordered chicken it was on the bone. No breast of chicken.. half the time it was hard to find any chicken on the bone in the curry dish! We had a nice meal in a place local to our hotel in Patan that was highly recommended by trip advisor : it was called El Mediterranean and the food was decent but the staff were fab. It also had great wifi so we relaxed and planned some future adventures while having a nice glass of wine.
Another restaurant we happened upon while looking for somewhere else in our neighbourhood was “Vesper”. It was really a wine bar that looked like they added food later. It was an outside bar with wicker chairs and low tables.. not ideal for dining. The food was served on fancy plates but was just ok. The bathroom was the nicest we saw on our whole trip and I told the waitress who appeared to be thrilled!!!
Our final lunch in Nepal was at a place called Lahkpa’s Chulo. It was actually the place we’d tried to find for dinner the night before.. no wonder we couldn’t find it – it was down a dirt road and very much off the beaten track but we were so pleased we found it. It was an oasis away from the dirty road and the food was great
We had some guacamole to start .. sure you couldn’t pass up those avocados which were massive and really delicious. Then I had a local dish that was very spicy called chhoyela – it’s meat marinated in Nepalese spices and served cold. It was really hot (spicy not temperature) but very nice. Suzanne had the fish.
TIBET:
In Tibet we had a home cooked meal in someone’s house which was interesting.. the food was great (although I wasn’t eating much) but I did taste a dish with potato and yak which was really good. It was called Lhasa Kitchen.
The breakfast at the hotel was awful – it was in a big half empty hall which was cold and miserable. It was very much a “Chinese breakfast” with mostly noodles and vegetables. Bread was sparse, the toaster was broken and there were no utensils!! Luckily I was on bug killing starvation rations and Suzanne found yogurt at the store next door that she liked!
BHUTAN:
The food in Bhutan was served buffet style 90% of the time – breakfast, lunch and dinner. Breakfast was nice – there was always eggs and some cereal and always veg!!! There was a really delicious home made apple and citrus jam in Paro that everyone loved.
Lunch and dinner were identical. Soup to start and then the buffet. There was always vegetables in soy sauce, some sort of chicken and rice. They do a “red” rice which was actually more like brown rice and it was really nice. They also served a chilli and cheese dish that was super spicy and had a bowl of hot sauce (like salsa) available so you could spice up a bland meal. I think this one was called eazy! In fact a lot of the dishes we had were spicy. In general the buffet food was good but often it was cold (well let’s say not hot!) and served on cold plates (arghh!). By about day eight I was losing my mind with the want for something different ….. so I bugged the guide to find us somewhere with a yak burger and of course he did. In Thimphu, the capital, we found a restaurant called Zone One which apparently had the best yak in town! Oh my goodness it was so worth it – I was happy out after my burger and chips and was able to skip the buffet that night.
The next day low and behold we had our first non buffet dinner at a restaurant where we could order pizza.. woo hooo.. I shared a local specialty spicy meat pizza and spicy beef fries – they were spicy hot and delicious!
I did love the little mini bananas that we got everywhere and it was fascinating seeing all the chillis getting dried on the roofs of houses and sold at the market:
Our guide never let us go hungry.. he always had snacks for us on the bus – chocolate bars including kit Kat and cadburys dairy milk (these were usually produced just before a hike – I think he was afraid we might not have enough energy for the climbs!), also delicious oranges. We also tried a couple of fruit growing on trees at various places we visited – guava and some others I can’t remember the name of!!
CAMBODIA:
The food in Cambodia was fantastic. From our first dinner in Phnom Penh to our last lunch in Siem Reap. We tasted amazing Khmer food…We went to a number of “responsible dining” restaurants (listed by lonely planet) and I had my first chance to taste Crocodile burger. I loved it!
In Phnom Penh airport there was a Krispy Creme donut counter.. get in there – had a sneaky little custard filled chocolate (aka Boston Creme) that was an unexpected treat.
In Siem Reap we had surprisingly good food and even more surprisingly good wine in a place on the very busy Pub street beside the night market.
We had a wonderful meal at Maram where we were served by disadvantaged kids getting training and support from an organization running various restaurants across the country.
“Nest” recommended by our hotel was a trendy bar with loud music.. great cocktails but not really our kind of dinner spot so we headed to FFC which although more up our street there was some kind of teenagers party on so that was interesting! There was a live singer and then more loud music as they played party games.. most entertaining to watch from the balcony!
Our last meal in Cambodia was our favourite.. and that’s saying something as we had a lot of good meals. We had wanted to go to a restaurant called Haven (another responsible dining opportunity where disadvantaged kids are taken in and trained for jobs in the hospitality industry) but it was booked solid for dinner so we were delighted to get a spot for a late lunch before heading to the airport for Vietnam.
VIETNAM:
Oh wow the food just got better and better on this trip.
Hanoi : The breakfast at our hotel in Hanoi served mini ban mih sandwiches so I was in heaven. On our first day exploring, for lunch although we could have stopped at a place a bit more authentic I had the most delicious papaya salad. The mango salads, papaya salads and Vietnamese fresh spring rolls were amazing everywhere we went. Around the corner from the Hilton we found a really good low key place called Vi Quang. I had a recommended local dish which I think was banh hom noi liu (or something like that) – it was a plate of salad, meat and rice paper that after some basic instruction I turned into really tasty wraps. Not sure what happened to the photo of the food but here I am looking delighted with myself!
During a visit to the old town oI tried some local fried dough…. not quite the donut I’d hoped for and definitely not worth the calories. It was more fun buying them than eating them!
HOI AN: Amazing food in Hoi An especially the famous banh mi… it was truly the best. I think the photos say it all!
The food on the cruise in Halong Bay was outstanding and there was a lot of it!
SAIGON: My final meal of the trip was a banh mi from a takeaway joint. It wasn’t the best one I’d had but it was pretty good and I just love a takeaway sambo!
odohertyelaine 