Try Quan Hue at 6 Ly Thuong Kiet Street.
These days, many Ha Noi restaurants serve Hue delicacies, but the first to do so was Quan Hue. In 1993, several Ha Noi residents who had grown up in Hue decided that they should open a restaurant to introduce the Hue specialties they remembered from their childhoods. Initially, their goal was to raise funds for projects in Hue. Having no investment capital, the group started its venture in a member's house at 6 Ly Thuong Kiet Street.
The house owner, Mrs. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Trai, went on to found RECAS (Research Center for Aging Support), which belongs to the Viet Nam Red Cross. RECAS was among the first Vietnamese non¬governmental organizations (NGOs) to form in Viet Nam. It sets up health screenings by retired doctors at senior-citizen meetings, introduces and provides the necessary training for home health care, and assists elderly who have no family support. Quan Hue's proceeds from one or two days of business a week fund the RECAS work, which has reached into thirteen provinces. RECAS is one of the few Vietnamese NGOs to build in sustainability by creating on its own source of funding.
Mrs. Ngoc Trai describes the evolution of RECAS as similar to making the best tôm chua (fermented shrimp). "To ferment good tôm chua," she says, "you need a few drops of alcohol. You need labor. You need time. The fermentation arises from the ingredients themselves. It's a natural process over time. You don't need to add outside spices to ferment good tôm chua. Factories add chemicals to shorten the fermentation, but their tôm chua is never as savory as the tôm chua made the slow, traditional way."