Luke Nguyen’s Vietnam Food Tour: Day 7
A Remarkable Chef with a Story to Match
A day off! This was a downtime day because nothing was scheduled. The vast and invitingly warm pool at the Vinpearl Resort beckoned us, so after breakfast, we chilled out up to our necks in water until the black clouds appeared with flashes of lightning. Not a good idea to be in a large body of water.
So, we took a Grab (the amazing Asian taxi service) to town to meet an exciting chef.
A couple of years ago, Luke was doing a TV show in Hoi An, and he cooked a meal (on the street, of course) with a chef named Duc Tran. Duc has three restaurants in Hoi An: Mango Rooms, Mai Fish, and Mango Mango.
The restaurants are filled with bright colors, tropical plants, and hand-built wooden tables and chairs. Mango Rooms sits on the edge of the Thu Bon River and is steps away from the giant Hoi An market. The food here was some of the best fusion we had on the entire trip — the ceviche and the duck especially stood out.
Duc is a high-energy and personable guy. We sat down with him at Mango Rooms and listened to his story unfold. It was remarkable.
Born on the outskirts of Saigon (now called Ho Chi Minh City), one of 11 kids, he was raised on his mother's duck farm. The family worked from sunup to sundown, selling vegetables in the market and making meals for the vast brood.
In the 1980s, as the situation got worse in Vietnam, his mother urged him, at 16 years old, to leave the country to find a better life. Easier said than done. He boarded an old fishing boat to make his way to Malaysia.
In those days, the seas around Vietnam were dangerous. Pirates boarded boats in search of refugees because they knew the family would have sewn small gold bars into the seams of the passengers' clothes so they would have money to live on as they established themselves in a new country. It would be the family's life savings.
To escape capture, Duc endured many hours below deck, buried under the ice used by the fishermen to preserve the fish. He barely survived. But he finally reached a refugee camp in Malaysia, where he worked in the kitchen, preparing meals for the camp's residents.
After a year, a church paired Duc with a poor Mexican family in Texas who adopted him. Even though he was unable to speak either English or Spanish, Duc found comfort and generosity with the family, and his adopted mother taught him how to cook Mexican food.
He was a fast learner, though, and after a couple of years at community college, he enrolled at Texas A&M, where he earned an engineering degree. But that career wasn't for him. He yearned to travel and spent the next 20 years traveling the world, cooking in Central America, the United States, Europe, and Australia.
Until one day, he came back to Vietnam and discovered Hoi An. It was the fresh produce from the fertile land, the fish from the rivers, the locally grown rice, and the serenity of the town that inspired Duc to rent space in 2004, build a kitchen and toilets, install bamboo tables and tatami mats, and paint the restaurant in vibrant Latino colors.
His worldly experience also inspired his cooking. He integrated the Latino influences of his adopted mother with traditional Vietnamese cooking to develop a unique menu not found in an everyday Vietnamese restaurant.
Soon, the restaurant was buzzing with customers. Celebrities, politicians, actors, and chefs flocked to the restaurants, including Mick Jagger, Tyra Banks, Jimmy Buffett, Eric Ripert, Luke Nguyen, and Gordon Ramsay.
Marriage to a Vietnamese woman named Ly, a family, and two more restaurants followed. We sat there, stunned by his story.
We would urge you to visit Mango Rooms if you're in Hoi An. You'll find Duc in the kitchen cooking, changing the music, or bouncing around the dining room, greeting old friends and new guests. You'll have fun and love the food, but most of all, you'll enjoy saying hello to the spirited Duc Tran.