Eating Veggie in Vietnam

Photo by Jack Young on Unsplash

Being a veggie abroad isn't always easy. Trying to navigate through menus you don't quite understand, or explaining to someone that you don't eat meat when that's completely unheard of in their culture is pretty tricky, especially if you're hungry! However, in my experience it's pretty easy to be a vegetarian in Vietnam.

I had read before I left that as it's a Buddhist country many food places go completely vegetarian twice every month, I saw no evidence of this, however. As in many places, I found street food to mostly be a no-go, mainly because it normally looked pretty meat-heavy and I wasn't able to communicate well enough to make sure that whatever I was ordering was meat-free. However, the fact that there are many practising Buddhists in the country did seem to mean that most restaurants at least had a veggie option.

Tofu was plentiful, and not the bland kind. Vietnamese chefs really seem to know how to flavour it just right, in a way that I have never been able to recreate. The same can be said for most of the meals I ate in Vietnam, in fact. I honestly had some of the best food of my life there, and have been searching for anything that comes close to it back in the UK ever since.

In terms of veggie culinary highlights, it's Hoi An all the way for me. I stumbled across a little vegetarian restaurant called Annen as I walked back to my hostel one evening, and seriously the food there is to die for. Their veggie version of the famed regional dish Cao Lau was absolutely delicious. I would recommend that place to herbivores and omnivores alike because it really is that good.
Another highlight in Hoi An was Minh Hien Vegetarian restaurant, a quirky and cool place with excellent food.

I hope this post reassures any veggies who are thinking of visiting Vietnam!