Food specialties in Quy Nhon

Vistitor to Binh Dinh are captivated by not only its landscapes and beautiful sceneries, historical and cultural vestiges but also by its many food specialties such as the Pork Roll of Cho Huyen, ‘Banh It La Gai’(patty), Bun Cha Ca Quy Nhon( roasted fish with rice vermicelli),… to be taken along some Bau Da Alcohol. Being a coast province. Binh Dinh has a great variety of seefood particulary lobsters giant prawns, crabs, squids, tuna and mackerel,… with which talented cooks prepare delicious dishes for the gourmet. Fermented pork of rolls of Cho Huyen is one of famous specialties of Binh Dinh province. This food is the quintessence of the province’s culinary science, a great food specialty is very famous not only in the province but also across the country. Travelers passing by Binh Dinh always buy pork of rolls very much to eat or give friends. Continues is a food also very popular with everyone. It’s ‘Banh it La Gai’. It is widely used as a offering in all ceremonies or wedding parties. It is made of sticky rice flour, sugar and green beans, wrapped in pinnate leaves and steam cooked. You can eat so much without worry stomachache. Visitors to Quy Nhon city can’t spare taking the ‘Bun Cha Ca’. ‘Bun Cha Ca’ in Quy Nhon is not only famous for quality of it but also famous for fresh vegetable. The vegetable in here very delicious and very attractive. You can feel this feeling when you eat both at the same time. They mix up together and great to such an extent that tourist keep want to visit Binh Dinh to be tasted other times.

The first street dish in my list is grilled fermented pork roll - a speciality of Binh Dinh - with soya sauce, chilli and fresh garlic. The most famous makeshift stall among those selling the speciality locates at the Tran Binh Trong - Phan Boi Chau intersection. The stall is always crowded. 

Next to the portable stall is a very well-known fruit juice shop. Many local people says that the fruit juice there is the best and cheap. There are two type of fruit juice: mixed grinding juice and cube-cut mixed fruit with milk and dried coconut. The dishes taste so nice. That’s the reason why the shop is always crowded and its customers have to wait.

The next dish is banh canh – a kind of local rice spaghetti. I find banh canh at a shop on Phan Boi Chau Street the best. The shop is about 50m away from the fermented pork roll stall and has a nickname as “shop of scolding”. Because the banh canh there is fairly tasty and the shop is rather crowded, the shop owner is God!

Tourists should enjoy this kind of specialty when visiting Quy Nhon city. It’s very delicious to enjoy a hot bowl of banh canh (rice spaghetti) mixed up with some pies of fried fish, a few slices of chili, and decorated by various species of vegetable to give it fragrance.

Quy Nhon’s cha ca (grilled chopped fish) is famous due to being made from certain species of fresh fish, such as lizard-fish, mackerel, and flying fish.

Fried or steamed fish are two kinds of cha ca. They are more delicious when being enjoyed with hot chili sauce.

Cha ca is the main ingredient for banh canh or bun ca (rice vermicelli with fried fish) dishes. The seasoning for the dishes also includes a cauldron of well-stirred paste sauce which is cooked from fish bone and other spices. There are two kinds of banh canh often made from rice flour and wheat flour.

Banh canh or bun ca shops usually open in mid-afternoon. Plates of fried fish, steamed fish, onions in small white slices, lemon and chili fish sauce are always ready in front of the guests’ eyes. After being ladled out into bowls, banh canh will be added a handful of fried fish pies, some green onion, split onion, pepper…You can squeeze a few drops of lemon juice and pour some chili sauce into the hot bowl of banh canh before enjoying. You will be pleased with this kind of specialty.

Opposite to the banh canh shop is a 3,000 ice-cream shop. The name 3,000 means that all kinds of ice-cream available there are sold at the same price of 3,000 VND. Don’t forget to enjoy the shop’s unique cuisine: mixture of 2 fruit flavored scoops and 1 flan cake. Others dishes such as Vietnamese shredded papaya salad with beef liver and dried cuttlefish seasoned with spices, sugar and salt are savory, too.

About 100m away from the ice-cream shop as the crow flies, a makeshift stand which sells shellfish and arkshells is situated on Tang Bat Ho Street, opposite to Le Loi school. The dishes are unspeakably delicious and dreadfully inexpensive!

You can find shellfish at another shop on Mai Xuan Thuong street, near the head office of Sacombank, Binh Dinh branch. The shellfish here isn’t as good as the dish of the former. 

A portable stall on Phan Dinh Phung Street is long popular for many years with its Vietnamese shredded papaya salad with beef liver. It also sells fermented pork rolls, sweet mung bean soup and sweet corn soup which are very luscious.

You may stroll along Quy Nhon beach near Seagull Hotel and enjoy grilled fish, cuttlefish with unripe mangos or guavas, eating grilled coconut milk flavoured rice cake with chilli sauce; drinking sugarcane juice at makeshift stands there at relatively low expense.

How can you forget Quy Nhon once you enjoy its popular dishes and recipes regardless by accident or by intention? Everybody who has ever visited the coastal peaceful city does talk about the dishes and recipes in his chats with friends later.