Street food: how to eat well, cheaply and safely

Street food is the best food here, and it is safer than most visitors expect if you choose well. How to pick a stall • Go where locals are queuing and the plastic stools are full. Fast turnover means fresh stock. • Choose stalls that cook or grill in front of you. • Eat at local meal times: breakfast 6 to 9, lunch 11 to 13, dinner 18 to 20. Food sitting out between those hours is older. • Look at the washing bucket and the raw meat. If it looks wrong, walk on. There is another stall in fifty metres. Water and ice Drink bottled or boiled water. Commercial ice, the cylinders with a hole through the middle, is made from treated water and is normal in drinks. If your stomach is sensitive, go easy on the raw herb plate on the first days. Paying Ask the price before you sit if there is no price list. A street bowl is cheap, often somewhere around 30.000 to 60.000 đ, and more in tourist streets. Tissue packets on the table are often charged, so carry your own. Two phrases that help • Không cay: not spicy • Ít đường: less sugar And one habit: point at what the person next to you is eating. It works better than any menu translation.