Luke Nguyen's Vietnam Food Tour: Day 5, evening

Finally, the rumored dress-up night arrived, and we met in a hotel dressing room filled with imperial-style clothing in all sizes, shapes, and colors.

We turned ourselves into royal princes and princesses (some of us not quite carrying off the fantasy) for an evening cruise on the Perfume River, followed by an elegant dinner at an ancient restaurant where street food was reimagined into gourmet imperial-style dishes. 

It was pitter-pattering rain that night when we turned up at the aged residence. We tiptoed along a stone walkway in the near darkness to a dining room in a garden. Six musicians played traditional Vietnamese music while we were treated to multiple courses.

For the dinner, we started with Bò kho, a braised Vietnamese beef stew in a vol-au-vent, a small, hollow case made of puff pastry. This was followed by pan-seared foie gras and phở gà (chicken soup).

The main course was mai cua farci, a stuffed crab, and nori matsutake roulade, a rolled pork dish with mushrooms and Asian spices, kind of a French/Vietnamese marriage. That came with three colors of sticky rice.

And dessert was Vietnamese crème caramel and a fruit cocktail.

It was still pretty hot in the evening despite the rain, so the costumes were being peeled off, and we were looking a lot less imperial as the night wore on. We bid the talented chefs (a father-and-son team) goodnight and retired to the hotel.