Yesterday we took a cooking class at The Vietnam Cookery Center. It was dorky and expensive but we had fun, even if we didn't necessarily learn a lot. All the prep work is done in advance and a platoon of staff delivers ingredients in front of you in little bowls so all you really do is assemble them. I think with the recipe book they provide I'll be able to make some tasty dishes, though. The best part for me was that we made caramelized fish in a clay pot which became my favorite dish on my first visit.You can do the class only or the class with a market visit. We were already very familiar with Cho Benh Thanh, so we could have skipped that. Then it's a fairly long ride out to Ben Thanh District to the cookery center. They have prep stations set up for about 20 people with the head chef in front. They walk you through making a salad, a main course and a soup, and then you retire to a big dining table and eat all that for lunch as well as rice and desert which they make for you.
They have a good shtick of making it sound like a tough course, mixing in lots of trivia and having a graduation ceremony at the end where the chef makes a big show of signing the diplomas. All-in-all, it was easily the most professionally run and least disorienting tourist experience we've had here.
-Robert
