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If you can't explore all 36 old streets to try the diversity of Hanoi street food, visiting Dong Xuan market alley in Hanoi's Old Quarter is the best option. It's a place filled with a wide variety of flavours that will satisfy your taste buds.
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Where is Dong Xuan Market Alley?
Dong Xuan Market Alley
Located right next to Dong Xuan Market, very close to its entrance, Dong Xuan Market food court just takes you a short walk. This market is a popular tourist spot in Hanoi and has many local restaurants that offer exciting food experiences.
The area is known as Dong Xuan market alley because it's a small alley less than 200 metres long, but it's filled with a variety of restaurants and unique dishes. These restaurants are small stalls covered with temporary-looking tarps, but they are always busy. Most of these restaurants have been around for decades, so their flavours are authentic and traditional. Visiting this place and enjoying the delicious street food in Hanoi's Old Town is a truly interesting and enjoyable experience.
Delicious dishes attract many local people
What to taste in this Hanoi street food market?
Pho Tiu - Mrs. Phuong's rice noodles
For those who live in the Hanoi Old Quarter, "Pho Tiu co Phuong" is a dish that comes to mind during dry weather or when craving something quick, fresh, tangy, and slightly sweet and sour. To ensure each bowl of Pho Tiu has all the flavorful sauces, there are five pots on the table. These sauces are poured over rice noodles, raw vegetables, and pork, and then garnished with fried onions and peanuts. The restaurant's vegetables, from lettuce to cilantro to marjoram to basil, look clean and fresh. The noodles are soft and absorb the sauces well. Before tasting the tender and aromatic meat, the crunch of fried onions and roasted peanuts awakens the taste buds, offering Hanoi's original taste.
Pho Tiu - rice noodles with sweet sour soup
Pho tiu Phuong is a family-owned restaurant that has been serving food for generations in Dong Xuan Market. While they used to sell Bun Thang, it is no longer on their menu. Diners can walk through Hang Chieu Street to reach the Dong Xuan Market alley, which is like a small culinary world in the heart of Hanoi. The bustling alley is filled with closely spaced food stalls. The tiny restaurant has long benches, accommodating only a few people at a time, so customers often have to wait.
Bun Cha Que Tre - The vermicelli noodles with grilled pork with bamboo sticks
Bun Cha Que Tre is a special restaurant in Hanoi, located in Dong Xuan alley, that is known for making the famous Bun Cha in a traditional way. It has been serving customers for a long time, and many people in Hanoi are familiar with it because of their delicious grilled pork. The pork is wrapped in leaves and skewered on bamboo sticks, then grilled over charcoal. They use tasty thinly sliced bacon, marinated with fish sauce, salt, sugar, and pepper. The meatballs are also wrapped in leaves. One unique thing about this restaurant is their homemade tamarind vinegar, which adds a special sour and fragrant taste to the vermicelli. Each portion of Bun Cha in Dong Xuan alley includes two skewers of pork slices and two skewers of minced pork. The restaurant is often crowded during lunch and dinner.
Rice noodles with Vietnamese grilled pork - Bun Cha Que Tre
Bun Oc - The rice vermicelli with snails
There's a small snail vermicelli restaurant at the end of the busy Dong Xuan Market alley. It's always crowded with customers, especially during peak hours when it's hard to find a seat. The restaurant serves two types of vermicelli with snails: with and without broth. The special thing about their broth is that it has a subtle fragrance of glutinous rice vinegar and a hint of spiciness from hot chilli peppers. The snails are cooked carefully, resulting in tender, firm, crispy, and flavorful meat without any unpleasant fishy taste. Each bowl of snail vermicelli comes with a plate of fresh vegetables, vinegar, homemade chilli, and a jar of shrimp sauce, allowing you to customise the taste according to your preferences.
Bun Oc - Snail noodles soup
Banh Tom - Co Am shrimp cake
Apart from shrimp cake in West Lake, you can also find delicious shrimp cakes at Co Am little restaurant in Dong Xuan alley. Unlike the fancy restaurants with a great view and lots of people, Mrs. Am's shrimp cake restaurant is small and tucked away in a corner of Dong Xuan market. That's what decorate Hanoi Old Quarter’s rustic beauty
Shrimp cakes - a specialty in Hanoi street food market
The most tasty and special dish at the Co Am food stall is the cake flour. It's not just a simple mixture of flour and tapioca like in other shrimp restaurants. Ms. Am prepares the dough very carefully. The flour is ground to a smooth texture, mixed with water to a medium consistency, and combined with sliced sweet potatoes and some corn. The crust is fried, but it won't be too dry. It turns out crispy when you bite into it, without being too greasy.
On top of the cakes, you'll find 1 or 2 small, fresh, and sweet shrimps. You can roll the golden shrimp cakes with raw vegetables and cilantro, then dip them in sweet and sour sauce with crispy kohlrabi before eating.
The shrimp cakes are made to order, so they come out hot and golden. Many people visit this place every day not only to savour the irresistible street food but also to experience the simplicity of the old town cuisine that captures the hearts of many.
Dong Xuan Market Alley is a must-visit spot for food lovers who want to experience the real flavours of Hanoi. Not only is it a paradise for the best street food in Hanoi Old Quarter, but it's also a great location to explore the local lifestyle and street culture of Vietnam's capital city.
