It all started as a trip to pick up a couple of freecycle items. Well, a package of lens wipes from freecycle and a free hard drive being given away by a friend who was moving out of town.
But then it happened. I drove by a Banh Mi joint off of Arlington Boulevard, and found myself pulling into the parking lot. I was sick, and I had grown fed up with eating soup and drinking tea. I wanted something different, something I hadn’t tried before. I glanced through the menu of the place, but couldn’t see much. I drove on.
At the next stoplight, I fired up my Treo, and launched Internet Explorer. Thumbing down to Google in my history, I searched for “Banh Mi” and hit the jackpot. A Washington Post review entitled, “The Banh Mi of My Dreams” was the fifth hit on the page. I clicked, waited for the page to load, and drove further east, looking forward to the next light. I admit it, I peeked a couple times while I was driving. It was 7:00PM and I was getting hungry. I looked down at the screen:
The moment is positively Proustian.
At Nhu Lan, a one-table Vietnamese sandwich shop in Falls Church, I take a bite of a “special combination” banh mi thit nguoi, which translates as “bread with meat cold cuts.” As I taste the pork liver pate, ham, cilantro and pickled radish, I close my eyes and I’m cruising the Mekong Delta at dawn in a funky long boat, as I did a dozen years ago, just south of the city of Can Tho.
It was a private river excursion to the Phung Hiep floating market, and breakfast was provided on board by the young local woman who was my guide. Considering the wild jungle passing by, I braced myself for fermented fish or the like, but instead she handed me a wrapped-up sandwich on French bread. It was my first banh mi, and each taste reminded me that the simplest things often are the most satisfying.
On the bustling street corners of Ho Chi Minh City, banh mi (a phrase that refers both to the bread and the sandwich) are as ubiquitous as half-smokes in downtown Washington. No doubt they are far more evolved than a dog on a bun; to me, they are one of the world’s great sandwiches.
For the more than 400 banh mi she sells each day, Ha Lu, Nhu Lan’s owner, toasts seven-inch French baguettes that are soft on the inside, with a thin, crunchy crust. Peek over the counter and you can watch her lovingly throw together a perfect banh mi thit nguoi in 30 seconds flat.
She slices the roll lengthwise, then on one side of the loaf smears a deep yellow house-made mayonnaise. (She won’t say how she makes the mayo, which the Vietnamese call “butter,” but surely the base is egg yolks.) The other half she covers with a smooth, rich pork pate that she also makes from scratch.
That’s just the start.
On go more pork products: a slice or two of star anise-flavored head cheese and good, chewy steamed ham that Lu prepares several times a week. For texture she piles on pickled daikon radish and carrot as well as a wedge of cucumber. In go a few slices of seeded jalapeno pepper and a sprig or two of cilantro. In a final flourish, she neatly wraps the finished sandwich in white butcher paper, secures it with a rubber band and hands it to the customer. The price: a bargain at $3.
Sold!
I had seen Anthony Bourdain make a visit to the Vietnamese shopping plaza known as “Eden Center” in Falls Church, my new hometown, just a few days before on an on-demand episode of No Reservations. Led by DC food critic Tim Carney, Bourdain visited Song Que, a staple for bubble teas and the ubiquitous (yet untasted and thus object of my pursuit) French/Vietnamese fusion sandwich, Banh Mi. My wife and I had just been there with the kids a few days prior for an after dinner treat after our first sit down at Huong Viet, just around the corner.
I zoomed into an unlikely parking spot in the always crowded expanse of asphalt outside the shops, and made a bee-line for where I guessed the little sandwich shop might be. I had only the street address of the shopping center, and experience had taught me that Eden was packed with smoke-filled indoor back alley bars, travel agencies, and bistros tucked into long corridors one only finds once they go looking for them. At night, these interior passageways pulse with the beat of dance music and the odor of harsh tobacco, and are home to just enough of the sort of places that make a big white boy like me feel like he’d best stay focused on his destination, lest he get run out by a small, well-armed cadre of wifebeater wearing, mustachioed Asian men not more than half his size.
As I rounded the first corner, I felt like I was in another country, shooting my own episode of an American travel eating show without the knowing assistance of a native guide. But I’d been here before, and as I made the second half of the loop, I came upon Nhu Lan, so small, I almost passed it by. I once owned a home with a closet as big as this place, but I’d long since learned not to allow looks to deceive me. The best food is often found in the least auspicious places, and after a while, you almost come to expect it whenever you see one.
The menu was simple - a white slab of plastic hanging on the wall, the left side in Vietnamese, the right side in English. Five menu items were spelled out in plain black lettering, and I zeroed in immediately on #1, the banh mi thit nguoi. I ordered two, and one of the meatball, which I had also read was good, and sat down to wait. Two young boys made their way back and forth from behind the counter, eyeing me with curiosity and amusement as they went. I was there for ten minutes, but the entire time, there were customers. All were Vietnamese, none were speaking English. In my experience, whenever this happens, it means that the place you’re eating is authentic, and probably very good.
I grabbed my bag of banh mi and paid with cash (these kinds of places never accept credit) and headed to the car. My curiosity overcame me, and I tore into the wrapper. The sandwich was, as the reviewer above indicated, ensconsed in crispy-soft toasted baguette. As with all southeast Asian cooking, I was immediately hit by the contrasting flavors - sweet and savory, spicy and and sour, each taste playing a note in a complicated harmony. I’ve never eaten headcheese before, but I’ve had my share of tripe, organs, pig ears and chicken feet, and there was nothing remotely unpleasant about it. The cilantro stood out in certain bites, as did the pickled radish and carrot, which balanced against the richer flavors of pate and pork aspic. I drove out of the plaza taking copious bites, relishing both texture and taste as I navigated seven corners on my way home.
Covered in crumbs, I arrived later than expected, but when I told my wife I had a treat for her and handed her a sandwich, wrapped in white butcher paper with the word “combo” hand-written on it in black marker, she didn’t seem to mind.
After her first bite, she simply said, “The flavors!” After the next few bites, she just kept repeating the same thing.
“Phenomenal.”
The best things in life may not be free, but sometimes, they’re pretty darn cheap.
