Da Nang Street Food Tour

Why I like this one

Guests always ask me the same question at the end of a tour: where do you actually eat? This is the answer.

Five or six places, none with an English menu outside, all of them somewhere I take my own family. Most dishes cost between 10,000₫ and 50,000₫, which is part of the pleasure.

Come hungry. Skip lunch. I am not joking about that.

Highlights

• Banh xeo and nem lui, wrapped at the table with a mountain of herbs
• Mi quang — the turmeric noodle dish this region argues about
• Bun cha ca, the clean fish-cake soup almost no visitor orders
• Ca phe muoi — salt coffee. It sounds wrong. It is wonderful.

The plan, hour by hour

This is how the day usually runs. Nothing is fixed — if you want longer somewhere, or you'd rather skip a stop entirely, just say so on the day.

1. 17:00

   Hotel pick-up

   We start before the rush, which is how we get the good tables rather than the plastic stools on the pavement.

2. 17:30

   Banh xeo and nem lui

   A crispy turmeric rice-flour pancake and grilled pork skewers. You wrap them yourself in rice paper with green banana, star fruit and a fistful of herbs, then dip them in a thick peanut sauce. You will get messy. Everybody does.

3. 18:15

   Mi quang

   Da Nang's own noodle: turmeric-yellow, with just a splash of broth rather than a bowlful, plus shrimp or chicken, peanuts, quail eggs and a crisp sesame rice cracker you break over the top.

4. 19:00

   Banh trang cuon thit heo, or seafood

   Rice paper rolls with thin slices of boiled pork belly and twenty kinds of leaf, or grilled scallops and clams if you would rather be by the water.

5. 19:45

   Bun cha ca

   A light, clean fish-cake noodle soup that locals eat when the weather turns. It is my favourite thing in the city and almost nobody visiting ever orders it.

6. 20:15

   Che and ca phe muoi

   Sweet soup with beans, jelly and coconut milk, which Vietnamese people call a snack and you will call dessert. Then salt coffee — condensed milk, salted cream, strong coffee.

7. 20:45

   Dragon Bridge

   A walk along the river to finish. On Saturday and Sunday the dragon breathes nine bursts of fire at 21:00 and then sprays water — we stand on the east bank, where you stay dry.

8. 21:30

   Drop-off

   Back at your hotel, very full and slightly slower than you started.

What's included

Good to know

• MeetingYour hotel lobby at 17:00
• TimingEvening. On Saturday and Sunday we time the walk so we are at the Dragon Bridge for the 21:00 fire show.
• LengthEvening, about four hours
• GroupPrivate — your group only