Vietnam: Food

We arrived in Hanoi hungry (which if you know us, you know is not a good state) and so as soon we settled into the hotel, we set out towards Green Tangerine. I wasn't quite ready to weave through the crazy traffic in the Old District, but the call of food drove me forward. OD had promised it was just a few blocks away, however, we got turned around several times (OD blames the GPS on the phone) and had almost given up when we finally spotted it. Tucked away from the street, the cafe had a cozy courtyard all decked out for Christmas. We were quite happy to finally sit down, gorge ourselves on bread, and have our first delicious meal in Vietnam.

Ever since we decided to go to Vietnam, I had been talking up how much pho I was going to eat. Now, if you've seen how much I can eat in one sitting, then you know I can't even finish a bowl, but I tried. OD seemed to prefer fried rice over noodles. Here is our meal the first night in Hanoi:

Bali: Food, Fruit, and Bats

Since we have been picky eaters since arriving in Singapore, we were just hoping that we would find the food in Bali edible. In fact, it was delicious. I haven't ate as well since we have been back (especially since I am poor cook). Every morning, we started the day off with crepe-like pancakes with fresh bananas at Beten Waru. For our first night we walked down to Wawa Wewe II for dinner. And we liked it so much that we went back the next night. 

We have become obsessed with blended juices made with fresh tropical fruit (one of our favorite combinations inspired the title of this blog), so we were happy to find that they are as widely available in Bali as in Singapore. I think we each had at least 2 juices a day. 

One memorable meal had to do more with the location than the food. The open-air restaurant was set high in the mountains, overlooking a valley of rice paddies. Lunch was buffet and OD discovered a new fruit (still haven't found out the name). Upon exiting, we watched the restaurant's pet bat eat its own lunch (see video). 

We also went to Amed Cafe and had Western fare (club sandwiches, fries, and onion rings) after a morning of snorkeling. The open-air restaurant is set against the beach; the waters here also hold a coral garden (which we didn't snorkel). The cafe is part of the hotel and dive shop complex, which has a colorful entrance.