Dear reader, I spent a week in Vietnam back in the mid-aughts. I had been living in Taiwan at the time, so Hanoi was only a three-hour flight away. The trip did not get off to an auspicious start. I left my wallet in the taxi on the way to the bus station, where we were to catch an airport shuttle. Thankfully, I still had my passport on me. My friend assured me she would take care of whatever expenses we incurred, and I could pay her back later. Unfortunately, she was robbed our first night there, while we were wandering through a bustling night market. Good thing she had left a wad of cash back at the hotel, but we would have to be very careful with how we spent it—we hadn’t even been in the country for a full day. Our comedy of errors didn’t end there: during a guided hike through a jungle, we ended up barefoot and muddy (as it turns out, cheap flip-flops were a poor choice of footwear); we got caught in a storm while kayaking in Ha Long Bay; and we lost each other for a panicked hour after hopping on separate motorbike taxis to visit Ho Chi Minh’s mausoleum. Think the Vietnam edition of White Lotus, though not sexy or luxurious in the least. But the friendly people and the delicious food made up for all of our misfortune (which, it goes without saying, we brought upon ourselves). With our remaining dong, we still managed to stuff ourselves daily with the best pho, goi cuon, banh mi and bun cha—all of it from roadside vendors and market stalls. It’s not hard to see why Anthony Bourdain, who visited Vietnam eight times, was so in love with the country. In a 2009 episode of No Reservations, Bourdain featured a particular stall in Ho Chi Minh City, where the late Nguyen Thi Thanh served soup that floored him. He dubbed her the “lunch lady” and the nickname stuck. Nguyen went on to earn a Bib Gourmand designation from Michelin and launch two more Lunch Lady locations: one in Vancouver five years ago and one on Ossington, which opened at the end of June—just over a month after Nguyen’s passing. In this week’s Table Talk, you’ll learn how the restaurant ended up here, and what’s on the menu. Also in this week’s newsletter: all of the Michelin-recommended restaurants taking part in Summerlicious, a roundup of the best pooch-friendly patios, a breakdown of the Royal York’s fancy-schmancy new picnic package, and more. |
