Cabbage, pomelo and peanut salad.

Oh hello! I’m here in Ha Noi, settling in and getting acquainted with the people, traffic and dust. I’m writing right now to the Nghi Tam soudtrack – staccato pounding of hammer on nail, the intermittent buzz of a motorcycle whipping by, the ever present horns beeping and the sweet sound of an opera singers practise session. I haven’t explored much on my own yet, partly because of exhaustion, though I think this feeling of being in the wrong place is keeping me locked up indoors. Never fear though, tomorrow is for exploration and you know what that means, much eating.

My outings have mainly comprised of grocery shopping and highlighted failure in my quest to become a dividing genius. See, the money here is confusing, I’ve got the notes and colours under control but the exchange rate right now is $1AU to 16,000VND give or take. Try dividing every price by 16,000  (or 17,700 if you want to be proper) and then trying to remember if this is a better deal than the place down the street. Oh, and to confuse things even more, Pmum doesn’t convert to AUD she is truly international and uses USD now.

Some things are more expensive here, but to be honest in my unemployed state I am loathe to spend any money at all, but some things are surprisingly cheap. I just bought a box of Maldon salt for 70,000 dong ($4.35), it would cost about $9 in Sydney, jackpot!

I’m sure you’re all wondering why so much grocery shopping is necessary. When I arrived the cupboards were bare, like some kind of nightmare fairytale, you know the scary ones with warty-nosed witches forcing you to eat scorpions, spiders or fusion sushi. I lie, they were not quite bare, Pmum had rice, honey, tea and coffee, fish sauce, unidentifiable Vietnamese sauces, eggs, a wide variety of dried fruit and nuts, soy milk, watermelon and 1 can of Bia Ha Noi. Making a meal of out that was a terrifying challenge which I turned down immediately, grabbed my wallet and ran to the shop. Now we also have polenta, coconut, butter, flour, basil, maldon salt, UHT milk, sweet yoghurt, cocoa and coriander seeds. It doesn’t sound much better I’m afraid. Regardless of the dire pantry situation, I managed to cobble this salad together today. It isn’t pretty, but then neither is Ha Noi.

Inspired by 101 Cookbooks Lime and Peanut Coleslaw and various others around the traps I asianed the dressing up and added some divine sweet-sour, juicy pink pomelo for contrast. A light and crunchy ensemble of finely sliced cabbage, chilli julienne, peanuts and pomelo perfect for the first day of summer in Australia, and also for the unseasonably warm beginning of Winter we are experiencing here in Hanoi.

You could roast the peanuts, I certainly wanted to and would have if only I could get the stove going. Fingers crossed there isn’t gas filling the room right now, thanks to the jury rigged kitchen set up here and my own inability to know which way a tap turns on. Seriously, this is an issue for me. A regular faucet is fine (though I did stay in a hostel in Kuching where every tap in the place was fitted back-to-front – that took a little while to figure out), but put a tap at any other angle and I’m useless especially if turning it has no immediately discernible effect. Back to the salad.

For the Cabbage, pomelo and peanut salad: Slice your cabbage finely. You can use a mix of regular and purple/red cabbage as I did, or even Chinese cabbage. Julienne as much chilli as you like. Mix together cabbage, chilli and dress. Add the pomelo and peanuts (roasted or not, but I think roasted and salted would be best) just before serving so they maintain their shape and crunch.

For the Dressing: I didn’t measure the amount, just did this by taste – try it – these measurements are guides only. Mix 1 teaspoon of sugar and with 2 Tablespoons of lime juice, stir to dissolve. Add 1 small clove of pulverised garlic and a glug of fish sauce, woah easy there fish sauce is hard to take back once its mixed in. Taste and adjust. I would have loved to add some neutral flavoured oil or even sesame oil to this but none was available, guess I’d better go to the shops again.