By Alison Spiegel, Huffington Post
Vietnamese coffee is famous for its sweetened condensed milk, as it should be. Thick, dreamy and yes, incredibly sugary, sweetened condensed milk is the perfect counterbalance for the incredibly strong, dark-roasted Vietnamese coffee. If you’re dubious about the merits of sweetened condensed milk in coffee, spending even just a few hours in Vietnam will change your mind. It hits all the right notes, and once you get into it, you’ll never want to go back.
Vietnamese coffee (Huffington Post)
Whether it’s served hot or iced, coffee will come with sweetened condensed milk in Vietnam almost without exception. If you don’t specify, your coffee will come with a layer of the good stuff in the bottom of the mug or glass, and if you ask for coffee with milk, you’ll get the sweetened condensed kind — not “fresh milk,” as it’s labeled in some places. If you ask for coffee without milk, you may get some stares, and you’ll probably end up with black coffee mixed with a ton of sugar. The coffee is so strong and bitter, a lot of Vietnamese people will think you’re nuts for drinking it straight.
There’s so much more to Vietnamese coffee, however, than the obligatory addition of sweetened condensed milk. While many people might not expect it, coffee is a huge part of daily life. Vietnam is the second-largest coffee producer in the world. The French brought coffee to Vietnam in the 19th century, and after the Vietnam War, the government instituted a massive coffee production program. By the 1990s the country’s coffee production started to take off and today Vietnam is producing 1.73 million tons a year.
You can find Vietnamese people drinking coffee morning, noon and night, at proper cafes or on little plastic stools on the street. Cafes — be they sit-down, indoor establishments or more casual street-side stalls where servers are constantly unstacking stools for people to sit on and then stacking them back up to make room on the sidewalk — are gathering places for people of all ages.
Coffee is traditionally brewed in individual portions using a phin, which consists of a small cup, a filter chamber and a lid that also functions as somewhere to catch dripping coffee. If the coffee is served this way, it forces you to slow down and savor the experience. You literally watch the coffee being made drip by drip, which not only stokes your desire, but it also forces you to sit for a few minutes while the coffee gets made. Of course not all coffee is served this way and you can also find fast cafes where the coffee has already been brewed and is ready for you to drink right away or take on-the-go. The classic slow drip method, however, is a real treat and reminder to slow down, which is especially welcome in the all-encompassing hustle and bustle you’ll find in Vietnamese cities.
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