Tu Quy Restaurant

I usually don't do Vietnamese restaurant reviews on this blog, mostly because I suspect the few people who read this would ever be in a location that I reviewed to give the restaurant a try. This is especially true for the review I am about to give.

Setting this up, I should say that I travel to central Vietnam quite a bit during the summer months, and when I get into the northern part of central Vietnam it becomes somewhat harder to find a restaurant to my liking.  As a matter of fact, today I am in Dong Hoi City, Quang Binh Province, and that last sentence could not be truer for this place to me.

My first time in Dong Hoi City, it really wasn't a city, but rather a town. A very miserable town with a hotel named the Nhat Le after the river that flows in front of it. We called it the Rat Le for the rats that inhabited it.  My first stay at the Nhat Le Hotel in1991 was quite a surprise to me. I was provided a room with amenities that would have caused riots in a US prison system. The toilet had no seat on it and the bed mattress was disgusting.

Dong Hoi has come a long way since those days, but the restaurant industry hasn't followed suit.  Even the restaurants at the "four star" hotels leave much to be desired. I imagine most tourist who travel here patronize the many shacks that line the road that runs north of the city and sell fresh seafood.  Seafood is easy because I like it grilled and grilled is hard to mess up.  But, I usually travel with others and we eat a lot of seafood when we dine with our counterparts.  My experience is that most of the Americans I work with don't like seafood as much as I do. So when I end up in Dong Hoi uninvited to a team dinner with our counterparts, I head to a restaurant that does traditional Vietnamese dishes that aren't seafood.

I don't even remember who introduced me to Tu Quy Restaurant, but it was in 2002 or 2003 when I first ate there. They only do about eight dishes, but they do them well.  There are several restaurants on the same street, but you can pick out the Tu Quy fairly quickly because it is the one with all of the patrons.  I like to hit it around 5:30pm before the rush that starts after 6.  The restaurant is located at 17 Co Tam Street, very near the Dong Hoi Market near the Nhat Le River.  If you do ever end up there, make sure you have the shrimp and pork pancake (bánh khoái or bánh bèo), and the grilled pork with lemongrass (thịt nướng xả ớt).  There are other dishes there, but these are my favorites.  Huda and Saigon Beer are both available and those are great beers on ice to wash it all down. I feel certain the ice is safe because it has a hole in the middle indicating it is made using a condenser and isn't drug through the gutter before it gets in your glass like block ice.

If you do end up in Dong Hoi City, I guarantee you there is very little joy here outside of the Tu Quy Restaurant.