Despite the shock value of my photos from a few days ago, Vietnam is a fascinating place to visit for the food obsessed. And while markets have always been one of my favorite places to wander through in developing countries, this was my first big trip abroad since I started thinking differently about food.

As I wrote previously, I wouldn’t recommend that people who keep kosher go there. It simply would be too hard to avoid the treyf. The default meat there is pork, and shrimp comes in a close second. It’s ironic too that one of the most common fish dishes, fish in a clay pot - a white fish coated in a delicious concoction of caramelized sugar, fish sauce, shallots, garlic, ginger and chiles, is made with catfish - once again, not kosher.
Toward the end of our trip, I remarked to my husband Paulie that maybe in another life the Vietnamese were all Orthodox Jews. Now they are making up for all the things they were denied with a vengeance. Of course I don’t truly believe that, but it’s a funny thought.

While regular readers of this blog may remember that I ate meat for the first time in almost 20 years on Thanksgiving, it didn’t turn me into a carnivore. In Vietnam, I ate more meat in one month than I had in the previous 20 years. In each case it was by accident, biting into dishes that I assumed were vegetarian because they looked to be, or because I ordered them that way.

On one of our last days, I bit into a supposedly vegetarian summer roll to find a bit of pork in it. I was so fed up at that point I almost broke into tears. At that moment, I couldn’t wait to be home, and be in control of what is on my plate, and be secure in the knowledge that in the Bay Area, restaurants know not to let a speck of meat anywhere near the veggie food.

But then at the same time, a few meals at vegetarian restaurants there were some of the best I’ve ever had. I’m still dreaming about a seitan with lemongrass and chilies, and a jackfruit salad. And while we haven’t been home a week yet, I know it’s only a matter of time before I pull out the fish sauce.

Despite the eviscerae, as Paulie took to calling the various sights of dead animals, I came away with a certain admiration for the way the Vietnamese eat. Unlike most Americans, who buy their meat shrink-wrapped and cut into hunks that look nothing like the animal it once was, the Vietnamese buy their animals while they are still alive. I think every adult there knows how to kill a chicken or pig, and make it fit for eating. Animals are treated far better than on our feedlots while they are alive. They roam around completely freely until slaughter time comes. But even in the way it is served, the animal often still looks like the animal. At one restaurant where some chicken was served, a claw was sticking out of the bowl.

Nor do they waste any part of the animal. Since squeamishness does not exist there, they eat every part that can be eaten, and then some.

I didn’t get the chance to visit a grocery store – and they do exist, in the cities – but most people shop at the markets anyhow. The discussions that we have about food miles are irrelevant there, because if it can’t be transported that day by motorbike or by boat, it doesn’t get to market. (And it is impossible to imagine how much food can be strapped to a motorbike, the main method of transport. A common sight is to see two live pigs tied to the back of one). The only exception are all the fake luggage and watches (can you believe Paulie bought a Rolex for only $35?) imported from neighboring China, but even that isn’t very far.

Another interesting revelation happened when we went trekking in Sapa, in the North. The scenery there is breathtaking, you hike through rice paddies as farmers work the land with their water buffalos. Another part of the attraction there is to stay with families who are part of Vietnam’s ethic minorities. Many have established “home stays” to take in tourists for extra cash, and it is a real window into how they live. You eat dinner with them, and sit in their kitchen while they cook. In our home stay, all the cooking was done on an open fire, with everyone sitting on low stools or squatting to chop and cook. Dishes were also washed in the squatting position, as there was merely an indentation and drain in the floor, no sink.

While this family had electricity, it was barely used. They used a small fan to keep the kitchen fire going. But what we take for granted, a refrigerator, was there, but not in the kitchen. It was kept in the common room. The only thing they have it for is to keep the tourists happy: it is stocked with bottled water, Coke and, of course, beer. It was as if using it to store their own food didn’t occur to them, because they only cook what is fresh from that day.