What to Drink in Vietnam: The Beer Guide for Travelers

In this video I'm going to talk about beer because I don't know any motorbike guys that don't drink beer or at least smoke something a bit exotic. So here goes. Roughly speaking starting from the cheap and going up to the expensive. Beer hoi. This is locally made beer usually costing around 12,000 to 15,000 vietnam dong. Very common in Hanoi. It can be found everywhere and generally Usually served in plastic jugs. Tastes pretty terrible but very weak as you can drink a lot of it before it has any impact. Locals often drink it with ice meaning it is diluted and even less strong. Overall it makes for a cheap evening of drinking. Although all beer hoi tastes the same and terrible to me. Locals take it very seriously and will become loyal customers of a place that serves the best beer hoi. Okay so up next. Cans and bottles. At least for me are very different things in Vietnam. For cans I'm going to group these together as Taiga, Saigon, Hainicun and Lerue. Why grouped? Because if you pour these into four separate glasses and get someone to taste them it is impossible to tell which is which. They are the same beer. Give it a blind test for yourself. How is Hainicun the same as Taiga you may ask? Well if you look on the cans they are all made in Vietnam. So the Hainicun you have here is not the same as the Hainicun you have at home. They cost between 12 and generally 15,000 dong depending on the location and these beers are best described as piss water. We drink them, we love them but they really are garbage. And in terms of strength, well normal expectations for a beer really, you can drink a lot of them but you can certainly go overboard. Again locals commonly drink these with water, I mean ice, which very much extends the drinking session. I'm quickly going to lump Huda beer into the above, slightly keeping it separate because it used to be good. But I think these days it is now the same as the others. Okay so now having made the bold statement that all of the above beers are exactly the same, I will finish by saying that Larue is my favourite of the bunch. It's a go figure. Moving on, there is one more of these local piss beers and that is Ba Ba Ba or Free Free Free in English. Generally very slightly more expensive, maybe 15,000 dong and it actually has a unique taste to it but not a hugely appealing one. A strange beer and I find around twice a year I have a random craving for it. There is definitely a time and a place for this one, I'm just not sure when or where that is. Moving on to bottles, which in my eyes taste significantly better than cans. Ultimately for some reason bottles can't really be bought in the average market shop, Circle K, GS25 or even in street markets. Bottles tend to only be served in restaurants or bars. Generally somewhere between 25,000 and 50,000 vietnam dong, very much depends on the place selling it. The kinds of beer on sale also depends on the location a bit. Ho Chi Minh and Hanoi have different beers on offer. Let's start with Hanoi as a location and then I'll talk a bit about Ho Chi Minh. Hanoi beer is relatively rare in Ho Chi Minh as well but it is my favourite beer in the north, solid choice. In general you tend to find a relatively wide range of just random beers in Hanoi but I haven't spent that much time here so a little bit out of my zone. I also like Tubog in Hanoi, it's a really great beer and I love it. Then in Saigon we have Tiger, it's rubbish, Tiger Crystal, it's rubbish, Heineken, it's rubbish, Saigon Green Big Bottle, it's hard to find now but if you can get one it's very sugary tasting but appealing. Saigon Red, slightly different but basically it's just a beer. And Saigon Special, comes in a small bottle and generally tastes the best and for me is one of the beers that gives me the least hangovers for some reason. It's a good pick if you're trying to be cheap but a little bit classy. Anyway, bottled beer in Vietnam is non-offensive, probably gives you about the right kick without getting you overly drunk too quickly. Okay, let's take a break from the beer list and talk about a massive elephant in Vietnam but not many people seem to know about. Beer storage. Yes, it's a problem. Why is it that Saigon beer can taste amazing today but then the next day it can taste terrible? Well, I put this question to a beer Saigon factory and it turns out it is a big problem for the beer companies and they actively have education teams on patrol trying to stop stores keeping the beer in the sun. It ruins the taste and the image of their brand. Anyway, the sun messes with the beer and that is what causes the foul tasting sugary beers that we sometimes have. Therefore, I've come to learn that going to restaurants and bars that look a bit clued up do tend to have better tasting beer. So the different tastes is not all in your mind. The same beer can taste different depending on the storage conditions. So let's talk a little bit about slightly more varied cans that you can buy in little shops like Circle K or The Streets. Usually costing between 17 and 35,000 Vietnam Dong and in the North you will have many different variants of Hanoi beer and they all taste pretty terrible but it's fine more than drinkable. Then in both Ho Chi Minh and Hanoi you will find Budweiser which is famous for tasting like water around the globe and you'll be happy to know it tastes like water in Vietnam as well. Not necessarily a bad choice for a hot country. Sapporo, often a bit more, maybe 80,000 Vietnam Dong, sort of seen as a luxury beer. It's fine. I drink it sometimes and the marketing of the can design sometimes lures me in. It's pretty cool. Then for Ho Chi Minh we have two bold cans. My favourite, something about this beer just wins for me. It's my regular these days. Zorich used to be my favourite but can't find it anymore. It's quite strong and has an element of being a real beer, a bit bitterish. There is Red Horse, seems to be a cross between vodka and beer. Very strong and a good way to knock yourself out quickly. Really, I do wonder who is drinking this stuff. We also have Asalis, I think, Japanese. I don't know how you pronounce it. I've never liked it but people have a thing for this one. Okay, let's talk about rice wine. Rice wine is very common in the north of Vietnam and it is extremely cheap too. Most guided motorbike tours will basically force feed you rice wine to save on the beer costs. We are the opposite and we respect that foreigners don't tend to like rice wine that much. It's drinkable of course so we offer the beers up instead. It's, well, I don't want to be offensive but low quality vodka basically. Although it tastes like dynamite or petrol, it isn't actually very strong and you will find you can take quite a lot of shots so don't be overly concerned if you find yourself in a rice wine drinking game. Of course, there is all sorts of different tastes and styles and here is my big mammoth of a jug that the landlady gave to me as a gift. I look at it and I ponder what I'm really going to be doing with it but there you go. Let's get fancy. Craft beers. The craft beer scene is massive in both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh. Countrywide really but specifically I think it's huge in Ho Chi Minh. The beer started around 100,000 Vietnam dong but usually more and working its way upward from there. Generally on the cheap end is the rooster blonde or something that says gold or pale ale. Usually anything that sounds fairly basic. They all have the same vibe really. They're nice enough. All of the craft beers in Vietnam pack a punch and really two pints and you will definitely know about it. Then we have slightly more fancy beers. IPA they will usually be called and you tend to get a blonde and a dark variant. Always tasting amazing and they will knock you over very quickly. There are so many brands and styles and local small brewers in Vietnam. You can get weird, wonderful and fancy if you want to look for it. Many places serving up taste plates for fun to help you choose what you like. In terms of bottled craft beer there's quite a few if you know where to look but to name some you might find in normal stores would be Heart of Darkness or in the old days Tete beer though I can't find it anymore for some reason. These things come and go. Hoa Garden not sure that's a craft beer but it's pretty common premium gear beer here and if you want to experiment you can try a shop like Anam Gourmet in Saigon. These places can get very expensive though. Any craft beer you like? My all-time favorite will be Heart of Darkness. Okay rattle off some, fire away. 7-Eleven has a really good selection of craft beer. The pricing is good and you can find that in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. The second thing is also in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City is Mega Market. Mega Market? Yeah. The pricing best I've ever seen. Cool. Let's talk about the dark side of craft beer at least for me anyway. One pint and I will feel strange the next day. Two pints and I will have a mild hangover and three pints I really do feel it the next day. Yet in England I can do a fair few pints without it bothering me so what gives? I've been told that the craft beers here are mega loaded with sugar which is why they taste so great and also why you can't sleep after drinking a few. It's like doing Red Bull shots basically. Your heart starts to thump really hard. This is not fact and I might just have a weird and bad reaction to something going on with the craft beers in Vietnam but there you go. All through Vietnam you are likely to find different beers in particular going around the north of Vietnam. Some Chinese beers, some Thai beers will start to creep into the mix as well. One of the hardest things to get right here is getting it cold. This is because the locals put ice into the beer. They don't cool it down first. Cold in Vietnamese is Lan and beer is actually pronounced Beer though just shouting random beers at the waiter will work. Tiger, Heineken, Tiger Crystal, anything like that will work. If you are really persistent you can get an ice bucket arranged and the beers put into that which sits next to your table. Another thing in plastic chair style Vietnamese restaurants they might just dump a pile of beers on your table. They bill you by the empties at the end of the session so don't be alarmed by the big pile of beers on your table. You won't be billed for those yet. Moving on not a bad trick if you are wanting western food is to type craft beer into google maps. Then you will see all the restaurants clued up to foreigners. Sometimes you might even find them in remote locations. Let's wrap this video up with a tiny bit of culture and etiquette. If you do find yourself drinking with Vietnamese people which is actually pretty common it is considered rude to sip by yourself. The way it works here is everyone puts up their beer glass says yo and you drink together. Generally not a sip but a reasonable sized gulp. Things can start to get complicated when you get extravagant versions of just saying yo or when people start challenging you to drink up. There's many different variants of this. These sorts of drinking games are very common here. It's fine to say no and it's also fine to sort of cheat and sip not consume as long as you're taking part. It's all just a bit of fun and you won't really get called out for cheating a little bit. No one actually cares. Vietnamese have a playful but relaxed drinking culture. No judgments. All fun. So just enjoy it. Thanks for watching.