PASSION FRUIT Hotpot & WATER BUFFALO BBQ in Saigon Vietnam

You guys ready for this? Hey guys, it's Mike Chen here in Saigon in Vietnam You know, I love hot pot and every single time I go to a different Asian country I always try to explore the local hot pot scene and kind of compare it to what I know And usually I always find something really unique and different than the Chinese hot pot that I grew up eating So let's go see what hot pot is like here in Vietnam To join me for this hot pot meal, my buddy Clay. What's up? Hey, you recommended this place. Yes, really good, right? What are we eating today? Well, we will be having a Gold hot pot. Gold hot pot. Yeah, gold thigh Grilled with champagne. Okay, the gold thigh. Yeah, it's grilled with champagne. Yes I didn't know you could grill things with champagne. Yeah, me neither. Really excited about that. And you said that they're letting us into the kitchen Yeah All right, well, we're in the kitchen. What is he cooking first? So he's preparing the hot pot for us. Uh-huh. This is the gold right here. Yeah, this is the gold This recipe has been around for three generations. Three generations here. Here, right here. You ate this before? Yes. You come here a lot Yeah, okay. This is my friend's place. This is your favorite place? Yeah. For hot pot. All right. This is the broth Can you ask him how long it takes to simmer that? About six hours. It's a big cauldron of broth. Yeah. Now we're gonna go check out the Gold Lake soaked in champagne Also, you want a big thigh or a small thigh? So this is the small thigh and This is the big thigh Look at this. I don't want to compare like this, but this is like the baby gold and this is like the parent gold I would love to have the big thigh. Okay, so the chef will prepare the big thigh first That looks good And there's a bunch of veggies next to it and what what is this? They only say that there's a like a combination of jungle leaf. Combination of jungle leaf, okay So we're eating the jungle right here. And how do you how do you go about eating this? Can I should I just like gnaw on that? Yeah, you just can grab the thigh and Go ahead With the champagne glaze it's a little sweet Incredibly smoky and you cannot taste the gaminess of the gold at all because gold is usually pretty gamey What should we do with it? We just wrap it in the in the jungle leaf You can wrap it in the jungle leaf. Take one of each and then wrap it around the meat. Dip it in the sauce It's smoky as heck because it's cooked over the charcoal. Also what I love Is the skin. The skin is very good. It's a little gelatinous. This is unbelievably good. And what do you do with the lemongrass? Well, you can dip it in the sauce and just eat it. I've never ate lemongrass raw before but It's kind of hard. Am I supposed to eat this? It's pretty hard. Oh That is really strong. That is really strong. Yeah That goes amazing. I love that skin so much. You think you can finish this thigh and all? Yeah, it's not even a contest Unbelievably good. Like I really can't believe this is gold All right, where we ate about maybe a quarter of this Yeah, I'm not even feeling anything is that's kind of weird because it is fatty meat Yeah, but I don't feel I don't feel like it's taking much space in my stomach, but we got a couple more dishes coming What's next? Well, I think we should move on to the goat breast. Goat breast. Yeah. All right, so we'll set this aside for now We're gonna come back to this. That's so good. This is the goat breast. Yeah, it's okra on here. Yeah. Yeah interesting I've never seen this pairing before. Oh This is literally a stove, there's a reason why this table is metal They just put this like burning hot stove right on the middle of the table cold inside and it's wooden charcoal I mean, this is really tender looking and this goes on in the okra and we usually eat the breast with the Fermented tofu sauce. Okay, and that's the fermented tofu. Yeah, fermented tofu sauce. All right done this side. Yeah My god, I think it's hacked me and I'm gonna flip the okra bit that okra is actually looking really good I think this is ready. I think it's ready. Yeah. All right. Careful. It's really hot Whoo, it is burning hot And it's ridiculously good. The best thing about the breast is the texture It's like the the beef I had in the pub the more you chew it the better it is The goat is not tender and it's bit chewy, but it has such a clean taste to it Again, no gameyness whatsoever. It's like that goat I don't know when it took like 20 showers before it went on our grill. I mean, I think it's clean I even like the okra It's usually okra is too slimy for me But here it's crispy after it's grilled and they do have hot oil here or satay and hot and chili garlic and chili I can add a little bit to my fermented tofu. Yeah But have you been to the US? No, not yet. We don't have I mean, we do have a lot of Vietnamese restaurants But I feel like we don't have as much variety, not nearly as much variety I've never seen anything like this before in the US. You don't have goat meat in the US? I mean we do but we don't have like, you know, grill a goat or like here's a goat leg And we'll roast it with some champagne. We don't have that And I guess this is here because we can wrap it into like a som or something I'm just gonna take a little piece. I don't want to dilute my goat I feel like there's a lot of wrapping going on in Vietnam. Yeah That's nice added crunch factor from the veggies. Well next is a goat hotpot Which has been like the signature dish of the restaurant for 33 years. 33 years Yeah, and this is the one you always come here for. Yeah, that's the one like everyone comes here for First time trying a Vietnamese hotpot and first time trying like a goat hotpot. Yeah. Oh, bring it on And that's what we saw them make earlier with that special broth. That's a lot of veggies. Egg noodles and pork Pho noodles. Yeah. Tofu. Is this a very typical Vietnamese hotpot? Yeah So you guys don't usually do like the Chinese one where it's like split in half and one side is spicy one side is not No, we don't have that Okay, this is what I love about different like Asian countries like they most countries have their own version of a hotpot All right, Clay, here we go And like you guys saw before some veggies, goat of course, a lot of mushrooms in here, too So do you add everything in first or do you start eating that already? Well, we usually start adding the tofu and the veggies. Okay, just a bit of everything. A bit of everything? Yeah, do you add the noodles too? Yeah, this kind of fits my hotpot personality because I'm a dumper I just love, I love dumping everything in and just letting it cook and the noodles as well This one we usually put in, you know, in our bowl and then we put the broth in. Oh, with the soup later Oh, so we wait a little bit for this I guess. What do you dip this in? Or do you dip it in anything at all? Fermented tofu sauce as well? And the fermented tofu sauce, if you guys don't know, in Cantonese cooking There is a popular dish called goat casserole and with that dish you also dip it into fermented tofu sauce So there is some similarities there. Tofu skin is like one of my favorite things in a hotpot I gotta try this mushroom. And the goat meat? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Or you want the skin bit? Oh, yeah, that looks good. That looks like a pig knuckle. I'm gonna try the goat first It's chewy, but that's because of the big piece of goat skin. Yeah, I love that gelatinous texture So yeah, it's chewy, but it's also really delicious. I've been wanting to try these mushrooms Mmm, I like the mushrooms. This is a really hearty hotpot. I got a piece of meat that's pretty lean. I tried a piece of meat with no skin. That's tender, man I don't know how they do it here But none of the goat I've had here, the hotpot, the grilled goat leg, the goat breast, none of it's gamey I had this dish, like a similar dish like I mentioned, the similar Cantonese dish And even that was kind of gamey, but this, not at all, like zero I'm actually really really surprised by that Really dig these mushrooms right away. All right, I think the noodles are ready? Yeah. And I'm ready for some of that broth Oh, that's good. I'm gonna take some pho noodles. Put some hot broth in there. Yeah Let's do it I'm gonna add a little chili and give me another piece of that goat meat Mmm, oh that broth is good. Oh, these noodles are good as well. Wow, and this broth Although there's tons of goat stewed in here. It just tastes like a really fresh bowl of meat broth I'm loving this. Can we get more of this broth? This broth is insane We just asked for some extra broth and if you come here, you gotta get some of that as well. That broth I could just sit here all day just drinking this broth and eating these pho noodles. There's something about this broth It's thick, not too much so, but it is thick And oh my goodness, it's just ever flavorful and this goes perfect with those noodles. The ramen noodles, they're okay But I am really digging these pho noodles. I like the pho noodles better too. Clay, thank you so much for showing me this place I feel like you're my hot pot buddy now because we survived the hot pot in the middle of a 90 degree heat wave or Just another day in Vietnam and when you do that with somebody else, you're hot pot friends for life. Cheers, my friend Anyway guys, this hot pot tour, it ain't over. We're gonna finish this up and we still got that lamb leg We're gonna go back to and then we're gonna keep going It is so incredibly hot here and this is the winter I can't imagine what it's like in the summer. A lot of people may not even want to eat hot pot when it's this warm outside, but for me, I'm a hot pot lover like to my to my core and throughout my life I've had hot pot all across China. I've had it in different countries around the world I've had spicy hot pot. I've had fish hot pot. I've had stinky tofu hot pot. But guys, I've never heard of a hot pot like this Air-conditioning. Oh, that feels so good. Oh good Lord. I Mean, I love hot pot. Like I said, I'll eat it anywhere but eating it in a nice air-conditioned room still the best So this restaurant this is called the Saigon grill and it's on the top floor of this building It's pretty and it's breezy definitely not air-conditioned and Like I said, there's a hot pot dish here. That's really unique Let me show you. Let me find a menu and show you guys. This is passion fruit hot pot. I Love I don't know. I feel like I just love the words passion and a hot pot in the same title That's something completely different than I've ever had before like Food hot pot. I've heard of a hot pot with a winter melon in there, but never passion fruit So excited but besides the hot pot got a couple other things, you know, not too much. It's just to prepare their prawns That's coming out of a coconut and the prawn is actually cooked in the coconut juice. Of course, you gotta suck on the head. Oh That's a bit sweet Not like just prawn sweet but coconut sweet too. Oh This is a fruity tasting prawn. The meat is just so succulent and fresh. This isn't just for show They didn't just boil some prawns in water and stick it in a coconut You can really tell that this has been cooked in the coconut juice I'm just gonna dip it a little bit in the coconut juice itself a little more, you know, just for some added coconut enos Guys you gotta try this 10 out of 10 my grill is here. This is really interesting There's actually charcoal in the middle and instead of barbecuing like, you know, beef short ribs and bacon wrapped in shrimp I wanted some things that Vietnamese people usually grow This is a egg fish because the fish typically has a lot of eggs and then I got some wild boar and what you're supposed to do is you get the oil and you Gotta be careful. Oh And you put the oil on the grill so your meat doesn't stick. So I'm gonna put up a little egg fish It kind of looks like a sardine. You can grill some chili peppers and some onions and you can dip it in This lime salt and pepper sauce. Oh It is chewy But guys wild boar is delicious see what it tastes like on it's own The chewy part is really all here in the skin right here. This part is ridiculously chewy The skin is tough. The fat doesn't really render at all in your mouth at the same time It's chewy, but it's got extremely clean flavor. I'm just gonna put on more boar meat because this thing I'm loving this All right. Let me take a piece of this fish here. Oh That's why they call it a fish. Look at that Look at all that fish roll. There's more fish roll than fish meat on this fish Holy cow, and the fish is already sort of marinated. So I'm just gonna give this a try Hmm. I do like the fish meat. Although there's really not much of it. Flavor is nice. The fish is really tender Nice smoky flavor to it. This is really not bad I'm really digging this thing. That's good. I like that fish. I do also have this green chili sauce Hello darling. A little spicy, a little citrusy. This is good with pork I feel like I got a couple of really good items for grilling here. Wild boar, absolutely delicious. The fish, unexpectedly good Wow, this fish is so fragile. You touch it, it falls apart. I love it. This fish is fantastic The meat is so delicate and sweet. Also, this is really fun Just sitting on a rooftop, got a beautiful view, nice breeze. It's everything I love about going to a different country The temperature is perfect. The food is awesome. You're having a great time That's when you know you have truly found food utopia And I'm also glad I ordered all these things because now the temperature is cooler. My stomach's warmed up Let's bring on the hot pot, you know after after I finish all this. Oh There it is Passion fruit hot pot. It smells spicy and exotic and taking a look inside see some onions, mushrooms I don't see actual passion fruit in here. So I'm assuming they just added some juice to it. Oh Yeah, oh yeah, this is good Wow, this is good. This broth, 10 out of 10, 11 out of 10 It does taste like a milder version of a tom yum So it's spicy, it's sour, not as sour as tom yum and then just a beautiful Beautiful, sweet passion fruit flavor. Yeah, you can definitely taste the passion in this hot pot broth I could drink this as a soup and the way hot pot is eaten here in Vietnam is really different than in China In China we dip the ingredients in usually a little bit at a time Then you take it out you dip in the sauce and you eat it But here you just throw every single thing you got like all the ingredients they give you throw it all Inside the pot and the only dipping sauce they gave me is fish sauce with a little chili inside so far I got a bunch of prawns and whatever this veggie is. So this is all going in watercress Of course, so excited about this guys after everything I ate. I'm still really really hungry All right, the prawn is ready and they already took the shells off again bite the head Mmm. Oh Instead of coconut flavor passion fruit. Oh, that's good This is gonna be really good. This doesn't happen often But right now I'm really excited about the veggies because the veggies actually soaked up a lot of that beautiful passion fruit broth That is so so good by the way, this is kumquat. In English it's called water spinach What's great about these veggies is that they're hollow on the inside That's perfect for this hot pot because then the soup gets trapped inside the veggie itself I've never been so psyched to eat vegetables in my life Oh also got some mushrooms enoki Cylinder mushrooms. This guy's is gonna go down as one of my all-time favorite hot pot experiences in my life Just because of how ridiculously good this broth is. I mean seriously in all my hot pot tours in New York City I mean rarely did I ever give a broth high marks? But this man this blows everything I had in New York out of the waters completely. Oh one thing. I'm gonna try So excited about this. I got some rice noodles What I'm gonna do is put this in my ladle and put the noodles inside the hot pot just to cook just a little bit This baby is gonna absorb this beautiful broth for me Take a bowl that has a prawn inside noodles go in and then just get that broth and scoop it in there guys This is gonna be epic. I'm gonna treat this like a big bowl of noodle soup. Oh Yeah, if you love hot pot You need to come to Saigon and do what I just did Take a bite of sweet prawn meat Mmm. Only thing is I wish I had some hot oil with me I gotta do another bowl of that this time rice noodles in the bowl broth goes in get some of that nice mushrooms in there Usually when I'm eating Chinese hot pot rarely do I ever drink the soup because it's usually overly oily But this are not oily whatsoever passion fruit noodle soup. Somebody should market this thing. I will bite this as an individual meal I actually can't believe I ate this much today, but everything I had here guys. I mean this place is fantastic Look around. It's at night. It's like 630 people are just showing up. The view is nice. Everybody working here is lovely There's so much passion in this passion fruit hot pot This has just been a really fun eating experience and that's the key thing about eating, right? If you're eating good food in a great place, you're gonna have some fun and trust me guys I had a lot of fun tonight and the hot pot barbecue tour. Oh, that's that's not over Let me I'm gonna finish this up I'm gonna go home and take a shower because I'm sweating like a like like the wild boar I just ate a little earlier and we're gonna hit up another hot pot tomorrow. See you there. Oh, sorry. It's me again I just want to add that I was kind of eating this kind of sparingly because there's not that much broth left And I love this broth so much I wanted to replace all the blood that's in my body But one of the servers came and just told me that I could get unlimited refills on this broth And she's actually gonna do it for me right now So, yeah this hot pot party it's gonna go on for a while the final place I'm going for some hot pot and barbecue is Huang 909 and what's unique about this place is that it's serving up meats I've never had before let's go eat a water buffalo Actually passed by a lot of restaurants that kind of look like this where there's like a hut everything's outdoors and people just having a Great time. I always wanted to visit one. So here I am just like most barbecue places I've been to in this country. They give you okra to grill. I normally don't eat okra at all I'm pretty sure I ate enough okra to last me a couple of lifetimes and the water buffalo is covered in some sort of marinade I see some scallions some garlic. Here we go. Oh I don't know if you can hear that over the sound of somebody apparently cutting down a tree or something But that's sizzling real nice. I think it's time to flip. Look at this It's getting real garlic all up in here, I think this is done and of course Bunch of fresh herbs and the sauce they give me is Fermented tofu with some chili pretty much the same dipping sauce. They gave me for the gold hot pot I just want to try this without the sauce first There's actually a bunch of different herbs on this marinade I just thought it was garlic but it's actually garlic there's some ginger here Now the only thing I can kind of compare this to is bison which I had before it does taste like beef but a Lighter version of beef and there's almost zero fat in the meat But seriously, although it's tougher is not it's not like chewing on a stale steak The meat is actually extremely flavorful and it's a pleasant chew. You know, sometimes chewy is good I think that's pretty much the case here this whole ensemble the fresh herbs the grilled meats and the okra the fermented sauce of chilies This works Now this is all grilled it's feasting time The thing is I really don't feel like they give you that much I mean, this is more like a water buffalo appetizer, but luckily luckily I got something else because when there's barbecue You're gonna need some hot pot All right got a fresh Martian fire cube here there's my hot pot. All right so far in Vietnam I tried the goat hot pot the passion fruit hot pot and we're gonna just wrap everything up with the water buffalo hot pot But I think my pot is ready You guys ready for this? I wish you could have smelled that I really do if you smell that you'd be running outside right now to grab something to eat It's like there's tons of veggies inside a lot of onion Look at this like a whole onion just just sliced up in here water buffalo meat and check this out like a lot of taro And a lot of leafy greens So I think what I'm supposed to do is take some greens maybe take a piece of water buffalo meat This one looks like there's some tendon here. Oh, look at that. That's all water buffalo fat That's what keeps the animal warm in the water some rice noodles. Dip it in some sauce. Oh Yeah, I wish I could make this part of my daily diet The difference between the hot pot and the barbecue is that the water buffalo meat here is much more tender Just slightly more gamey because it doesn't have the ginger and garlic. I just want to try this meat on its own The beefiness is about the same as in it's not all that beefy But the texture is a whole lot less tougher than the grilled version I do feel like the water buffalo tastes better in the hot pot Maybe because you know, it's a water buffalo and it's sort of in his natural habitat here in the soup What I really want is something with this broth because every single hot pot place I've been to in Vietnam The broth just blew me away That's the best part of this hot pot and you can see the broth itself very clear a lot lighter than the pho broths I had before and speaking of pho, let's add some rice noodles in this broth And we're just gonna add some basil add some chilies Yeah, onions are stewed nice and soft It's sweet too. Got some chili and satay. I really like that seasoning. It's like the Southeast Asia version of hot oil Two bowls went down like it was nothing But guys, this is one of my last days in Vietnam and time really just flew by and learning about the hot pot culture of This country has definitely been one of the highlights of my trip So after the camera goes off, I'm just gonna sit here and enjoy some personal hot pot time Which I feel like everybody needs but as always guys all the places I went to is listed in my description box below Thank you all so much for watching. I'll see you later