Eating Viet Nam: Dispatches from a Blue Plastic Table

In this wry, entertaining food and travel memoir, journalist and “Noodlepie” blogger Holliday escapes a future career as an office drone by expatriating to Vietnam, where he makes his living as an English teacher. His true passion, however, is the quest for the best and most interesting street food in Ha Noi. At first, locals only point him to “big, fancy-schmancy” hotels “serving western, ‘Asian’—whatever that is.” But upon further digging, Holliday unearths the pleasures of street-stall bit tet—“A thin slice of beef [that] comes with three (count them) potato fries, a token sprinkling of green onions, a fried egg, and a ball of peppery coagulated cow blood”—pho, and, of course, bahn mi, the Vietnamese baguette sandwich, which merits its own chapter. Holliday’s lively chronicle of the beginnings of his blog, Noodlepie, at the dawn of the blogosphere, sets the stage for his successful transition from English teacher to freelance writer. Writing in an inviting style with ample humor, and using his intricate knowledge of street food and life in Vietnam, Holliday keeps the pages turning with stories of food that is delicious—the search for the perfect bun cha, “the astounding lunchtime BBQ pork and noodles”—and more questionable: “As the pig’s uterus landed on the blue plastic table in front of me, I knew I’d made a mistake.” (Apr.)