On Bourdain's Trail: Ho Chi Minh City's Ban Xeo 46A

On our last vacation to Ho Chi Minh City, we wanted to go to a place where Bourdain visited. We walked so far to this place from our hotel. Since there was nothing much to do in Ho Chi Minh for us (other than eat and explore), we decided to see the cityscape by walking to Ban Xeo 46A. When we got there, there were also a big group of tourists also eating in the place. We saw some traditional wood-fired stoves at the entrance, and the woks used to cook the ban xeos.

A Ban Xeo is a light and crisp crepe with shrimps, pork and beansprouts. And as the restaurant’s name says, it seems to serve only that but we did order some spring rolls first.

The spring rolls were already at the bring of full sogginess, only some of the skin parts were still a little crisp, this wasn’t really anything great. We were waiting for the famous Ban Xeo, but we were a tad worried about the fact that we only saw foreigners in the restaurant at that time, maybe it was our timing…we were about 1 hour late for the lunch crowd.

The giant ban xeo reached our table and it looked so light and yet filled. We immediately began wrapping them in the mustard leaves along with the various herbs on our table and dipped them in this vinegar and fish sauce mixture with pickled radish and carrots. It was delightful! the mustard leaves had a nice spicy bite to it and help cut the richness of the crepe and its filling. The sauce was wonderful and actually brought a variety of tastes in every bite.