Hanoi: The Lifestyle & the Food

Ngọc Trân grew up in Hanoi but spent many years away from the city. The invisible connections she maintained with it – the memory of quiet alleyways, the specific flavours of a cuisine shaped by centuries of northern refinement, the particular light of a Hanoian morning – eventually became the material for a book. Not a guidebook, and not a memoir, but something between them: a photographer’s account of a city that she knows from the inside, shaped by years of living it and years of missing it.

Hanoi: The Lifestyle & the Food moves through the city the way a local would, without an itinerary. The chapters take the reader from basic ingredients to flower markets, from narrow alleys to teahouses, from lunch counter to barber shop to the History Bridge at dusk. The writing and the photographs are by Ngọc Trân herself; the design is hers too. The text was translated by NPD Khanh and edited in English by Michael Arnold and Trần Thị Thu Hạng. Published by Phuongnam Books, the volume is the first in Ngọc Trân’s ongoing series Vietnam: The Lifestyle & the Food, which also includes Saigon: The Lifestyle & the Food and Istanbul: The Lifestyle & the Food.

Hanoi is a city that rewards the slow walker, the person who notices the bowl of bun thang on the corner table rather than the landmark behind it.

A city known only to those who live in it stays local. A book carries that knowledge to readers who may never arrive, and back to those who have already left.

Wandering the streets of Hanoi and seeing the city through the eyes of photographer Ngọc Trân, the city’s veil is lifted. In this dreamily conveyed, casually told and yet deeply informative narrative, we are drawn deep into the Hanoian world of streetside tables, cluttered windows and yellow-hued walls with their criss-cross shadows as if we are taking a well-trodden pathway home.

Ngọc Trân’s Hanoi: The Lifestyle & the Food eschews the picture-postcard style of many photographers, preferring instead a more intimate look at life, culture and food. In no hurry, we wander transfixed across the town through its side streets, watching everything we see with warm recognition, all courtesy of our guide’s authoritative and confident insider’s knowledge. Each page is a rich tribute to Hanoians and their city: beautifully styled food photography of popular local dishes juxtaposed with images of the lives of those who create the food and those who enjoy it, adding an authentic and reverent vision of a culture that has captured the hearts of many visitors to Vietnam.

“Pho will always be the soul food of Vietnamese cuisine, but for me, the best noodle is thang noodle. Thang noodle’s making is demanding in the extreme, requiring considerable skills and dedication from the chef. Bun thang is not something that just about anyone can make. This makes it unpopular as a commercial food item. However, it is among the best representatives of Hanoi’s gourmet cuisine.”

“Bun Thang has a long history. Historically, it is made from the leftovers of Tet… served with a dash of shrimp paste and garnished with a few slices of fresh red chili, a bowl of thang noodle is art de cuisine for your eyes, your noses, and your tongue. Its flavor will surely carve out a strong memory in your mind.”

— Ngọc Trân, Hanoi: The Lifestyle & the Food