16/08/2026
A Little Gem in D**g Hoi, Quang Binh, Part 2
On my recent trip to D**g Hoi, Quang Binh , where my mother was born, we found a little gem: a beautiful restaurant serving traditional Vietnamese food, with caramelised pork leg and pork belly on the menu. "Thit kho", the very dish I grew up on, the one my mother cooked for us week after week in Hanoi. The Quang Binh version was its own creature: the meat darker, slow-cooked with more chilies and whole vines of fresh green peppercorns still on the stem, served bubbling in a clay hot pot. My son loved it so much we ordered a second pot. Watching him eat his grandmother's dish, in his grandmother's province, in his own generation's way - I didn't need to taste it to be full.
Quang Binh kept surprising us. We found a natural hot spring where we could boil eggs, even cook a meal in the spring water itself if we wanted to. The children enjoyed boiling eggs so much, and we didn't need to go out for dinner that night. :)
I loved everything about Quang Binh while we were there: the heat and the hot sun, the beautiful beaches and the Nhat Le river, the caves of Phong Nha - Ke Bang, and even the changes that are making Quang Binh more popular among Vietnamese and international tourists alike.
But the real flavour of Quang Binh is not the food and not the landscapes. It is the people. They speak with a soft, lilting accent that makes ordinary words sound gentle as if the heat, the sun and the hash weather have little effect on them. They are not in a hurry, and they live every day with a strong belief in themselves, in life and in the better future. In my mother's tales, life in Quang Binh was once hard and people had very little; today they have built their lives up with quiet perseverance and determination. Quang Binh now has everything the rest of Vietnam has, and still, they smile. That is what I love about them.
If you visit Vietnam, go beyond Hanoi and Saigon. Put Quang Binh on your list.
