We have always loved Chả Cá Lã Vọng in Hanoi, we have visited twice the original restaurant.
During this Vietnamese trip, we wanted to revisit this delicious grilled fish. The traditional dish uses Hemibagrus, a type of Catfish found in the river northern mountainous area. The fish is marinated with spices like galangal, turmeric, they are grilled on charcoal until both sides are almost cooked. They will be finished off with a pan with dill and spring onion in hot oil. They are served with rice vermicelli, fried peanuts and coriander with a dipping sauce, with nuoc mam, vinegar, salt sugar and garlic or shrimp pate (mắm tôm) mixed with lime juice.
We arrived around at 11am, this was our last meal in HCM before catching our 3pm plane. Service was efficient, they instantly brought all the plates with ingredients ready…
Dill and spring onion chopped
We find the portion of vermicelli tiny.
Not too much a fan with this sesame rice crackers.
The fish brought to our table half cooked, before the final cooking by a waitress with herbs.
The fermented shrimp sauce
I didn’t know they charged us for the wet napkin…until now!
I find taste wise, it was good, but I find Chả Cá Lã Vọng in Hanoi superior, more herbs, bigger portions and with richer in taste with more oil or fat and a bigger hotter fire. Maybe since we didn’t like the sesame chips, we find the food portion small, we were not very hungry when we entered the restaurant, but we didn’t feel very full when we leave.
Please note that the restaurant only serves 1 plate, if you want choices, this is not the place to come.
Chả Cá Lã Vọng
3 - 5 Hồ Xuân Hương
P. 6, Quận 3,
Hồ Chí Minh, Vietnam