1.GIANG COFFE

Giang Café is humbly hidden on a small lane on Nguyen Huu Huan Street in the city’s

old quarter. It may be difficult to find for visitors, but it is well worth the effort. It

continues to be hugely popular among Hanoi’s coffee addicts with its special ca phe

trung, or egg coffee.

Giang Café was founded by Mr. Nguyen Giang in 1946, when he was working as a

bartender for the famous five-star Sofitel Legend Metropole Hanoi hotel. Although the

café has been relocated twice, its egg coffee recipe is almost the same as in its early

days, with its chief ingredients being chicken egg yolk, Vietnamese coffee powder,

sweetened condensed milk, butter and cheese.

The coffee is brewed in a small cup with a filter before the addition of a well-whisked

mixture of the yolk and other ingredients. The cup is placed in a bowl of hot water to

keep its temperature.

Mr. Giang’s son, Nguyen Tri Hoa, says his father developed the recipe in days when

milk was scarce in Vietnam. He used egg yolks to replace milk.

“We want to offer a kind of drink with the bitterness of pure coffee together with the

mild and pleasant taste from the fluffiness of the whisked yolk and its protein….  And

people here love it, especially on a cold day,” Mr. Hoa said.

Mr. Hoa said the coffee beans are carefully selected from growers in central Vietnam.

He roasts the beans himself without using any additives to keep the pure flavor of the

coffee. Meanwhile, he chooses eggs grown by households outside of Hanoi, avoiding

eggs from large chicken farms where industrial feed is often used.

“In the old days, when electric egg beaters were not available, our customers had to

whisk the eggs by themselves, using a tool made from bamboo sticks,” Mr. Hoa said.

“Some used to spend up to 30 minutes to beat their eggs before they could drink the

coffee.”

Coffee has now become one of Vietnam’s key agricultural products and export

earners, after it was first introduced into the country in the middle of the 19 th century

by the French. Vietnam has exported 1.37 million tons of coffee valued at $2.92 billion

so far in the 2012-13 crop year ending Sept. 31. With Vietnam’s rapid urbanization,

backed by an economic growth averaging 7% a year over the past decade, new

coffee shops, including Starbucks, have been opening throughout the country. But

Mr. Hoa said he will keep Giang Café small and simple, as it has always been.

“Many of my customers have been coming here regularly for up to 20 or 30 years.

And we have also seen more and more young people coming to drink our egg coffee. 

But we have no plan to expand our business,” Mr. Hoa said. “People enjoy coffee by

all senses. So a quiet and simple place will work.”

Several other coffee shops in Hanoi have also started offering egg coffee with

different styles and prices, giving the curious an opportunity to decide which is best.

2.TURTLE TOWER

The Turtle Tower

At the northern end of Hoan Kiem Lake is an islet on which stands a small tower.

Called Thap Rua (Turtle Tower), this structure honors the magic turtle that still guards

the sword of Le Loi.

The story goes that around 1886, a Vietnamese mandarin in the service of the

French, persuaded the government to allow him to build a tower on the islet. What he

kept secret was his intention to bury his father’s remains on the Turtle Islet, a place

considered favorable according to traditional feng shui belief. However, the people of

the city discovered his plot and they removed his father’s body.

On the top of Turtle Tower there used to stand a version of the Statue of Liberty,

placed there by the French. The statue was destroyed when the Tran Trong Kim

government took over the city from the French administration in 1945. 

Although only a shell of a building, with pointed Gothic arches not at all in the style of

Vietnamese architecture, and built by one remembered as a traitor, Thap Rua has

become an important symbol of both peace and patriotism to the people of Hanoi.

The revolutionary flag was often hoisted here during the era of resistance to French

rule. The green area around the tower is where the turtles bask in the sun and lay

their eggs./.

This delightful tower stands on its own little island in the middle of Hoan Kiem Lake. It

was erected in 1886 on Turtle islet, the former fishing site under King Le Thanh Tong.

Before it was built, the Restored Le Dynasty (17th and 18th centuries), known as the

Trinh Lords, had Ta Vong Temple built on the islet, but this left no trace into the

Nguyen Dynasty.

Anyway, Turtle Tower was built in the 19th century as a reminder of the mystical

happenings. The tower has 3 floors, and its ground floor was originally built in the 18th

century. The other floors were built in 1884. This is seen as a place in which the turtles

live, born eggs, sun exposure...

The name “ TurtleTower” attracts many visitors.  They wonder that  there are real

tortoises in the lake? The surprising answer is yes - and some are huge ones, like the

one which was retrieved in 1968 that weighed 250 kilos and was 2.1 meters long. How

they got there or whether they are indeed descendants of Le Thai To's golden tortoise

remains a mystery.

Hoan Kiem Lake is in habitat by rare giant fresh water Tortoises, presumably the

largest fresh water tortoise in the world. Every now and then the giant turtle do come

up out of the murky water.

It is a pretty place to escape (some) of the noise that is Hanoi. People come there

early in the morning to excersise...I prefer to sit, drink coffee, and watch. Too much

excercise can't be good for you...at least not in all that smog!