Is Cha Ca La Vong Any Good?

Cha Ca La Vong (21.035194 N, 105.848253 E), 14, Cha Ca Street.

Yes, it’s on Cha Ca Street. I don’t know whether the road is named after the restaurant, or the restaurant is named after the road. Most of the locals say the road was named after it.

This little 2 storey, century old wooden building is situated right in the middle of Hanoi’s old quater, about 10 minutes walk away from Hoan Kiem lake. It’s really that famous that you can find it being recommended in most of the travel and food guides you can find. It’s even featured in New York Times!

So I thought, this 5 generation old restaurant must be one heck of a restaurant. I have no excuses not to give it a try as I’ll be here for 7-8 weeks. I wanted see for myself what’s so special and famous about it.

First, they have no menus. They serve only 1 dish, grilled fish. Upon sitting down, the waitress presented me with a plastic laminated paper that reads :

Either you answer yes or no, and how many person’s serving that you want to order. Wait for about 10 minutes and the fish is served.

The fish is served in a frying pan on top of a charcoal burner. It also comes with rich noodles and some vegetables which I’m supposed to mix them together with the grilled fish.

All in all, 100,000 VND.

For me, it’s slightly overpriced. Nothing really special though. It tastes like the grilled fish in kunyit back in Malaysia but those in Malaysia is half the price.