Work through the list in order. Hide the notes when you know what to do.
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Eat pho bo for breakfast
A clear beef broth simmered for hours with charred ginger, onion, star anise and cinnamon, with rice noodles and thin slices of meat. In Hanoi it is a breakfast, not a dinner.
Northern pho comes with almost no herbs: spring onion and perhaps coriander. Hoisin and sriracha do not go in the bowl here; that is a southern and overseas habit.
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Try bun cha
Grilled pork patties and belly slices served in a bowl of warm sweet-sour dipping sauce, into which you dip rice noodles and herbs. A midday dish, Hanoian by origin.
Add the noodles and herbs to the sauce in batches rather than tipping everything in at once. Fried nem ran rolls usually come alongside as a separate order.
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Eat cha ca
Chunks of white fish in turmeric finished in a pan at your table with a huge quantity of dill and spring onion. Eaten with rice vermicelli, peanuts and shrimp paste.
Dill is almost unique to this dish in Vietnamese cooking and is a northern trait. The mam tom shrimp paste is pungent and can be swapped for fish sauce.
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Try banh cuon
Paper-thin rice crepes steamed over stretched cloth and rolled around mushroom and pork. A breakfast made in front of you in seconds.
Fried shallots go on top, and it is served with diluted fish sauce. Look for shops with the cloth stretched over a pot right by the entrance.
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Try bun rieu
A tangy tomato soup with crab paste, tofu and rice vermicelli. The crab is a freshwater variety pounded shell and all, which leaves soft flakes floating in the broth.
The sourness comes from tomato and fruit vinegar rather than plain vinegar. Herbs and shredded salad come alongside and go into the soup yourself.
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Eat nem ran
Fried rice-paper rolls filled with pork, wood ear mushroom and vermicelli. They are called nem in the north and cha gio in the south, and they are the same thing.
They are wrapped in a lettuce leaf with herbs and dipped in diluted fish sauce. The unfried fresh version is goi cuon and is served cold.
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Grab a banh mi
A baguette with a crackling crust and airy crumb stuffed with pate, meat, pickled carrot and daikon, coriander and chilli. A French colonial legacy that turned Vietnamese.
The Vietnamese baguette uses some rice flour, which is why it is so light. Ask for less chilli if unsure; it goes in fresh and fierce.
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Try xoi sticky rice
Steamed sticky rice with fried shallots, meat, egg or beans, wrapped in banana leaf. A morning takeaway sold from baskets on street corners.
Sweet versions with corn or peanut are sold from the same baskets. The baskets vanish by nine; this is food on the way to work.
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Try bun thang
A clear chicken broth with fine strips of egg crepe, chicken and cured pork arranged in wedges. A Hanoi dish invented to finish the New Year leftovers.
The presentation matters: the ingredients are cut into strips of identical thickness. The broth is made with chicken and dried shrimp, which is where its depth comes from.
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Get a fried street snack
Banh goi is a pillow-shaped fried pastry with meat and mushroom; banh ran are glutinous rice balls with sweet or savoury filling. Both come from pavement woks.
They are eaten with herbs and diluted fish sauce for dipping. Take them straight from the oil; half an hour later they are not the same.
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Try che Desserts and pastries
A cold dessert soup of beans, tapioca, jellies and coconut milk over ice, eaten with a spoon from a glass. There are dozens of versions and every shop makes its own.
Point at the components you like; that is how the glass is assembled. Mung bean and sweetcorn che are the most common.
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Try banh com Desserts and pastries
Green squares of young glutinous rice com filled with mung bean paste and wrapped in banana leaf. A Hanoi speciality, given and taken as a gift.
Real com is young rice toasted and flattened, with a grassy aroma. Fresh com season is autumn, when it is sold loose wrapped in lotus leaf.
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Drink egg coffee Non-alcoholic drinks
Strong coffee under a cap of whipped egg yolk and condensed milk: thick, sweet and closer to tiramisu in a cup. Invented in Hanoi in the 1940s when milk was scarce.
It comes in a cup standing in a bowl of hot water to keep it warm. You spoon the foam together with the coffee rather than stirring it in.
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Drink ca phe sua da Non-alcoholic drinks
Strong coffee dripping through a metal phin filter into a glass of condensed milk, then poured over ice. Vietnam is the world's second coffee producer, and the bean here is robusta.
Waiting for the filter to finish dripping is part of the ritual and takes about five minutes. Robusta is stronger and more bitter than arabica, which is why the condensed milk is not a whim.
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Drink tra da on the street Non-alcoholic drinks
Weak iced tea poured for almost nothing at pavement cafés with plastic stools. It comes with everything by default and is the excuse to sit on the kerb for hours.
Most street places bring it automatically and do not charge for it. Its relative is tra chanh, lime tea, drunk in the evening around the cathedral.
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Drink bia hoi Local alcohol
Fresh unpasteurised beer brewed in the morning and drunk the same day, which is why it costs almost nothing. Poured from kegs on street corners and drunk on low stools.
It is low in alcohol, around three per cent, and drunk mug after mug. Stalls run from midday to evening and close when the keg is empty.
