What they eat in Vietnam

Just finished a great book -- review will follow -- called Catfish and Mandala (Picador 1999) by Andrew X. Pham. Mr. Pham is a "Viet-kieu", a Vietnamese-American, one of the many who came to the USA as a child in the 70s, in the aftermath of the Vietnam war.

After growing to manhood in California, this "boat person" decided to return to the land of his birth to discover his roots (as the cliche goes) and rediscover himself. Catfish and Mandala is thus an autobiography rather more than a travelogue, a journey not just in space but in time.

Pham bicycled -- alone -- from Ho Chi Minh City (the Saigon that was and still is) to Hanoi. Along the way he ate some thoroughly disgusting meals, even by third world standards. Here he describes a dish he was offered in Hoi An (not far from Hue) but declined. It's called "Gaping Fish" and here's how the Vietnamese chef said he would prepare it.

It is a dish I learned from a great Chinese chef when I went to Canton to study. I can make it with any sauce you want, garlic-lemon-butter, French tomato and mushrooms, or Chinese sweet-and-sour. Anything.

It's very hard to make. First, I must tell the fisherman that I need the fish alive so he'll keep it in a bucket for me. I take two bamboo sticks that I cut myself. They must be the right thickness and length [he explains, holding his hands about eight inches apart].

I stick them into the fish's mouth, piercing its brain just so. This paralyses the fish. It is alive but it cannot move. I don't gut it. I heat up oil just right. I put fish in hot oil, vertically so that the head is not in the oil. If the head gets in the oil, the fish dies right away. The fish is paralyzed so it doesn't flip around and splash oil. I don't want to get burned.

I cook fish just right. If the oil is too hot, the fish dies too soon. If the oil is not hot enough, not all the meat will be cooked. That's the real hard part. You must know when that is. You must be able to tell if it is about to die. You don't want it to die.

Some species of fish are tougher than others, and every fish is different. You must take everything into consideration: How big? When was it caught? Young fish or old fish? How you can tell is... you watch the eyes!

I put it on a plate covered with fresh lettuce, pour the sauce of your choice on top. Bring it to your table myself. Then I take the bamboo sticks out. And if the fish doesn't gape [he mouths the gaping part, making O's with his lips] if it's dead, you don't pay. Free. On the house.

I guarantee you that as you eat the cooked flesh of the fish, it is still alive! Alive and gaping!

Enjoy your lunch...