Yui Avi works for an airline in Vietnam and has lived HCM City for seven years.

Besides the passion for her job, she also loves traveling and regularly shares videos of her cultural and culinary experiences on her YouTube channel.

Most recently, during a trip to Hanoi, Yui Avi visited a restaurant in Kim Ma Thuong in Ba Dinh district to enjoy bun oc, one of the best known specialties of the city.

At the restaurant, she ordered a full serving of bun oc, containing large and small snails, beef, and pork rolls, priced at VND55,000. The restaurant also provided fried breadsticks and aromatic herbs for customers to use as they wished.

When the steaming bowl of bun oc was served, at first glance, Yui Avi noted that the serving was full and appealing, highlighted by an orange-gold hue from the tomatoes.

She couldn’t hide her excitement, sampling the broth to savor the dish's authentic flavor.

“Oh, this is delicious. It suits my taste. The broth has a naturally sweet and sour flavor from tomatoes,” Yui Avi said, adding that she was curious about the herbs, especially the ivory-white slices of young banana stem.

“This herb looks quite strange. I’ve never tried it before,” she remarked.

After trying it, she commented that while the flavor wasn't particularly distinctive, it was refreshing and crisp, different from other herbs she had tried in Vietnam.

The Japanese guest said she chose bun oc as suggested by one of her friends, who said it was one of the must-try dishes in Hanoi, and gave her a list of the best known bun oc restaurants in the city.

Yui Avi said it was flavorful, with a pleasantly mild sour taste. The rice noodles were soft and well-seasoned, while the accompanying ingredients were delicious, with fresh, juicy snails and crispy pork rolls seasoned with pepper.

“Snails combined with the tomato-based broth were very tasty. This is a flavor I hadn’t experienced in HCM City. It was wonderful to enjoy such a dish in the chilly weather in Hanoi,” she said.

She suggested that diners add vinegar, garlic, and chili paste to experience a noticeable change in the dish's flavor.

Shrimp paste is a common seasoning for this renowned Hanoi dish. However, Yui Avi admitted she avoided adding it because of its distinctive smell.

She really enjoyed the ‘delicious and well-balanced’ dish though she admitted she initially hesitated to try it.

Thao Trinh