Hai Phong food tour trend

Coming to Hai Phong to enjoy the cuisine is becoming a trend, after many introductory videos appeared, along with word of mouth effects.

Seeing her friends take the train to Hai Phong to experience a food tour, Dieu Huong, 26 years old, set off on the trip during the April 30 holiday. According to Huong, Hai Phong is a nearby destination, easy to travel to in a day, and can do familiar things that her friends often do in Hanoi such as dating to eat, chat, and sit in a coffee shop, but it is different and can "change the air".

Huong said that in the past 1-2 months, she has been watching videos about food tours in Hai Phong. The eye-catching images, beautiful colors and inviting voices of travel bloggers stimulate the need for food. Huong booked the trip plan and train tickets a week in advance. "Let's try taking the train, even though it's bumpy and slow." Trains are also the means of transport chosen by many tourists from Hanoi to do food tours because Hai Phong station is located right in the center, convenient for traveling to many restaurants.

Spicy bread from Hai Phong. Photo: Son Tung

Dieu Huong's food tour includes vermicelli with crab spring rolls, coconut jelly, spicy fish vermicelli, spicy bread, banh beo, and snails. She commented that Hai Phong has a diverse cuisine from savory dishes to sweet snacks. The rich dishes make her want to come back. "80% of the introductory videos only point to delicious restaurants, 20% are not really special restaurants, probably depending on taste," Huong said. Of the dishes she has eaten, she found the spicy fish vermicelli and banh beo not delicious, but the rest are delicious "as rumored", for example spicy bread, vermicelli with crab spring rolls.

Dieu Huong shared that famous restaurants are crowded but there is no jostling or overcharging, just time wasted waiting in line. She had a memorable experience at a spicy bread shop when she ordered 300 pieces to buy as gifts but couldn't because there were too many customers. To be quick, most customers buy pate and bread separately to spread on themselves. If they want to buy pre-made spread, visitors can experience cutting their own bread, then giving it to the staff to spread the pate. "I feel like it's a 'group' activity, a very interesting cultural experience," Huong shared. The staff was busy but still guided her to do it together, helping Huong have a fun and memorable trip.

Son Tung, 35 years old, has been planning to do a food tour of Hai Phong since 2021 but due to the Covid-19 pandemic, he has only been able to do it now. In Tung's mind, Hai Phong is still most famous for its dry wharves and containers, so he wants to experience something different at the simple street corners and street food. This year, he decided to go by train because he likes taking photos and wants to check in on the train and in front of the station. "If you are not in a hurry to handle personal matters, taking the train is safe, fast and on time. For a long time, the train has been forgotten by many people," Tung said.

Son Tung inside Cat Bi market - a food court with many delicious snack shops in Hai Phong. Photo: NVCC

Tung chose typical dishes that only Hai Phong has such as spicy fish noodle soup, crab noodle soup, crab noodle soup with mantis shrimp, porridge, banh duc tau, bo bi, bean sprouts, spicy bread, banh beo, chrysanthemum tea, coconut jelly, coconut coffee... According to him, every dish is delicious but the most impressive is spicy bread served with chi chuong (a type of Hai Phong chili sauce). In total, he enjoyed 19 dishes, but still regretted not having enough time to eat some more dishes such as snails, crab noodle soup with spring rolls. Although some dishes were not as delicious as advertised, Tung still wanted to come back next time because they were "delicious, nutritious, and cheap".

Hoang Huy, 25 years old, also went on a food tour in Hai Phong after reading the comments, especially the negative ones. After experiencing the food, Huy said that many dishes were "over-praised" by reviewers.

"When I hired a taxi to go to a crab noodle shop that was praised for its deliciousness, the driver said, 'No one in Hai Phong eats at that restaurant, don't trust what they see online.' But out of curiosity, I insisted on going anyway, but it really wasn't delicious. When I returned to Hanoi and shared my feelings with some people who had eaten at the same restaurant as me, everyone said that we shouldn't trust the videos on the internet too much," Huy said. My advice when going on a food tour in Hai Phong is to ask more locals to show us the delicious restaurants, not just look them up online, so that we can have a complete experience.

Working in Hanoi, Hoang Phuong, 25, from Hai Phong, is "both sad and happy" when the number of visitors to Hai Phong for food tours increases dramatically. "I'm happy to see my hometown is getting attention from tourists. I'm sad because I have a rare opportunity to go back to my hometown to enjoy the specialties but everywhere I go it's crowded or out of stock," Phuong confided. However, Phuong still hopes that Hai Phong food tours will become more and more known to promote tourism in her hometown.

On May 7, the Hai Phong Department of Tourism announced an online culinary map, and a printed copy will be distributed for free at Hai Phong train station in the near future. The map helps visitors easily choose restaurants and learn about delicious dishes in Hai Phong. To avoid overload. Each dish on the culinary map is suggested by many restaurants, serving a variety of tastes for visitors. Restaurants appearing on the map are selected based on the criteria of being delicious, recognized by locals and ensuring food hygiene and safety. In addition, the Department is also coordinating with other departments to build an electric car route to transport passengers from the train station to restaurants at affordable prices.

Mr. Vu Huy Thuong, Deputy Director of Hai Phong Department of Tourism, said: "Food tours are a characteristic of Hai Phong tourism". During the 4-day holiday from April 30 to May 1, the number of visitors to Hai Phong to take food tours by train was about 25,000. Of which, the two days of April 30 and May 1 were the peak with 6,000-7,000 visitors per day.

"We have seen the recent 'explosion' of Hai Phong food tours. This type of tourism has been implemented for several years, coordinated with promotion through many media channels, social networks, and travel groups," said Mr. Thuong, adding that security and order are always ensured when shops are crowded. Police will be present at crowded shops, but to make tourists feel comfortable, they are all in plain clothes.