Just wanted to share this photo I took of friends Michael & Michelle, who will be getting married in a month’s time. For some reason it really resonates with me. Hope you like it too.

As promised, the second half of my assignment for Riviera Magazine, and below, another excerpt from Miles:

“Northern Vietnam has produced a number of the country’s most iconic dishes, including pho, which is nearing total assimilation into the American appetite. Vien Dong is no less canonical. The restaurant has for decades been a Little Saigon staple, gleaming and spacious with musical instruments fastened to the walls and a fish tank casting a cool blue glow toward the door.

Start with cha gio, egg rolls fried until their rice-paper skins blister with beautiful little bubbles. Then go to work on the bun cha ha noi, a deconstructed noodle bowl assembled at the table. Wriggle free a few noodles, prune the herbs—cilantro, perilla and the like—and top it all with charred pork submerged in sweetened fish sauce. Bun rieu is a noodle soup of the sea, a mildly sour tomato-based broth swimming with crab, shrimp and, optionally, periwinkle snails.”

Find the rest here.

bún chả ha noi (rice vermicelli noodles with grilled pork patties)

bún riêu oc (tomato noodle soup with crab and periwinkle snails)

chả giò (egg rolls with minced pork)

bánh bèo (steamed rice cakes with chopped shrimp, fried shallots, and scallion)

goi bap chuoi hen (manila clam salad with shredded banana blossom)

perks of restaurant food photography, sampling the dishes.

bánh khọt (coconut pancake cups with shrimp and mung bean)

nem nướng cuốn (rice paper rolls with grilled pork patties)