WHERE was me, again....?

Right - took a long-ass break to head back to The States......and, before that, I was talking about....

....CAPTAIN BRIBE!

Right, so, let's go back in time and finish up what had happened before I left for North America.....

....today, we are gonna talk about the delicacies available in Vietnam.

Now, I am NOT what one would call an "adventurous eater" (though, I HAVE dined at Mighty Taco a few times in the past), and, actually, I am very picky about what I like to eat. Needless to say, in terms of food, I shoulda went to another country.

No, I AM NOT criticizing Vietnamese food....but....honestly.....errrmmm....it's just not for me! I mean, yeah, I can eat rice and noodles and the WONDERFUL bread that they bake here (a sort of left-over cultural effect from the French colonial days), and, of course, the Phố Bà, but everything else....errrmmmm....doesn't really appeal to me - again: I'M A PICKY EATER!!! I'm not even huge on AMERICANISED Vietnamese food, like in restaurants in Portland......

So, I had discovered a Western restaurant on Minh Khai called "Texas Bar-B-Que". It does ribs OK (NOT great, but edible), good garlic bread, decent spaghetti, GREAT apple crumble, and horrible pizza and chili. But I had seen on their menu one of my all-time favourites: cánh gà or, "Wing of Chicken".......

....allright - THIS should be good forra laff, I thought to myself.

Well, it wasn't a laffing matter - the wings had not been left to deep fry in the oil long enuff, and the sauce was basically Tabasco sauce.

It brought me much dishonour, being from Western New York an' all.....

PLUS, they hit you fiddy-thousand Dong for FOUR WINGS!!! That's, like, seventy-five cents per wing! In Hai Phong, that is VEERRRRY much on the pricey side.....

....so whass an estranged Buffaloian to do?

Do what all estranged Buffaloians shoulda done before they left: Take matters into my own hands!

So, I went to one of the two hypermarkets in town (Metro - Big C is the other), and found cánh gà in the meats section (but they were still together - like they serve 'em in the Southern U.S. - ya gotta cut them through the bones into wing SECTIONS to make them authentic), found cooking oil, and actually found (I couldn't believe this) a deep-fat fryer!

Well, I AM ABSOLUTELY NOT going to tarnish my wings with Tabasco sauce.....and there ain't no Frank's here, so I figgered, for the sauce, that I hadta improvise.

There's a little shack (literally, it IS very small and shack-like) just offa Broadway on W. 1st Avenue in Denver called "Hot Wings To Go". Now, this place is very unassuming, and does NOT go out and advertise and scream "WE MAKE THEE BEST BUFFALO WINGS ANYWHERE!!!" or any rubbish like that.

But they DO make good wings....

......so, amongst their four or five varieties of wing sauce flavours, there is a flavour called "Singapore Hot"....which is this weird, spicy, hot, tangy, sour, salty kind of sauce that I had tried and absolutely fell in love with!

Over the years whilst residing in Denver, I was actually able to replicate this sauce, and make it a teeny bit tastier than the original. So, since I'm a lot closer to Singapore right now than Hot Wings To Go is, I figured that I could scrounge up the needed ingredients here at Metro hypermarket and a few beakers and test tubes, and away I went!!!

I needed guinea pigs, though. I mean, this was the first time I had attempted to make wings on foreign soil, using ONLY locally available ingredients....so I hadta try 'em out on somebody.

So I called the family I used to live with and asked 'em if I could make them lunch. They were willing participants, and away I went over to my old house, with my deep-fat-fryer, and all the sauce ingredients in tow on my skooter.....



(no, the over-sized Vietnamese grapefruit was NOT part of the ingredients, but they are reeeaaallly good, and they may yet become part of the ingredients of this sauce in the future)






















Hang cutting the wings.......

Soooo.....I fried 'em up, blended the sauce. I was scared - I mean, these folks had never had chicken wings the way that we are used to 'em......so I didn't know WHAT to expect! But they got a nice reception! Cuong (the father of the family I had resided with) brought in some beer, and I proclaimed "THIS is the food of my people....."



























Apparently, they got SUCH a nice reception from my Vietnamese family, that I had been asked to come back as soon as possible and make them AGAIN! Was a bit busy, but I promised them that I'd be back in a coupla weeks to make my cánh gà again for them. I was very honoured by the compliments that I had received from Ngoc, Hang and Cuong about my wings....

....So, my buddy Suzanne was having a house party the next week, and it was a sort of potluck dinner. So, I had decided to try my wings out on Hai Phong's miniscule Foreigner population.....THIS should be an interesting response, I figgered.....

.....well.....didn't hafta figger TOO long.....

.....thirty wings got inhaled by six Tay in LITERALLY a matter of three minutes.

Emmmmm-Kay.....

DID make it back a few weeks later to my old house, and served Cuong, Hang and Ngoc another batch of my wings.....

...apparently, expressing their delight with these wings wasn't good enough for them.....

....they got placed at the Altar of the Ancestors.....

























Literally, I nearly shit myself! I mean, I know my wings are GOOD, but, Christ, to be placed at a family's altar?? I was speechless and dumbfounded......I mean, I didn't know what to say......

...probably the most important honour I have received in my entire life.....especially considering that Hang's a DEVOUT Buddist (chants every other morning and such), and that things don't just get dropped at the family altar willy-nilly.....

Brought back over a gallon of actual Frank's Red Hot with me from Buffalo.......

....the ancestors must be licking their chops now.



Few more stories.....this time, about a trip to a private island, and a change in employment (which, pretty much everyone already knows about by now) coming up within the next week.....

...really....within one week...this time I mean it!!!


-E-