At 81, Do Thi Huong still rises at dawn to cook and serve meals at her one-square-meter “count-the-dishes” food stall in Ba Dinh District.
For nearly 40 years, a tiny sidewalk eatery in Ba Dinh District, Hanoi, has served up humble home-cooked meals at prices that seem frozen in time. Run by 81-year-old Do Thi Huong, the stall is known by regulars as the “rice count” place - where dishes are priced individually and counted aloud, one by one.
Every morning at 10:30 a.m., Huong carefully arranges a few wooden tables and plastic chairs under a small umbrella at the entrance of a narrow alley in front of her home. Then she brings out steaming trays of food she’s cooked from scratch, ready to welcome her loyal customers.
Though her stall is no more than one square meter, it's enough to fit 10 plastic chairs and three modest tables. For nearly four decades, the menu here has remained unchanged: 15 simple, rustic dishes found in any Vietnamese home. Dry-fried anchovies, caramelized pork belly, stir-fried morning glory, salted peanuts, fried eggs, pickled mustard greens, and more. Diners also get a free bowl of sour starfruit soup to balance the flavors.
At 81, Mrs. Huong still cooks and serves every guest herself. Photo: Nguyen Huy
Customers call it “count-the-dishes” rice because every order is priced aloud. Huong calculates the total by adding up items: 5,000 VND (about $0.20) for a piece of pork or fish, 2,000–3,000 VND for pickled vegetables or peanuts. A full meal, with meat, veggies, and soup, rarely exceeds 30,000 VND (just over $1).
The stall opens daily from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., serving students, laborers, and nearby residents. Her food, modest and flavorful, offers enough variety to avoid monotony - salty, sour, savory, and always cooked just right. Among the most popular items is her braised fish, which she buys the day before from a trusted source, then cleans, seasons, and slow-cooks for hours until firm and fragrant, with a dark, glistening sauce infused with pepper and ginger.
“I start work at 5:30 in the morning, go to the market, prep the ingredients, and finish cooking by 10:30,” Huong shares. “The most expensive dish is 5,000 VND; the cheapest is 2,000. Customers can eat as much as they like. There’s no special recipe - it’s just how people cook at home. I’ve done it so long, I know it by heart.”
Still working, still smiling
A full meal of braised pork, stir-fried vegetables, stewed egg, and pork patty costs just 30,000 VND, served in a plastic bowl. Photo: Nguyen Huy
At 81, Huong’s energy is surprising. Rain or shine, she’s out at the same time every day. Even on rainy days, when the sidewalk floods, customers still sit along the alley to eat. Her commitment hasn’t gone unnoticed.
Huong has three children - one son and two daughters - all of whom now live independently and have stable jobs. Her eldest son often stops by during lunch breaks to eat with her.
“In the beginning, my children didn’t want me to keep doing this. They thought it was too hard,” she says. “But I told them, I’m still healthy and I’d rather work than sit at home. Running this stall lets me cook, talk to people, and stay active. Eventually, they agreed and now support me.”
Before opening the rice stall, Huong worked countless jobs. At 11, she cared for other people’s children to help her parents. As an adult, she worked in construction, cooking for labor crews, and selling various street foods like cassava, rice porridge, and snail noodles. But selling rice has been her most enduring occupation.
Despite her age, she has no intention of "retiring" just yet. Photo: Nguyen HuyMs. Hien, a regular customer, says the food here tastes just like a home-cooked meal. Photo: Nguyen HuyRain or shine, she sets up her food stall right on time every day. Photo: Nguyen Huy
“There were times I thought about quitting,” she recalls. “Business got slow, and I considered switching to something else. But in the end, whatever job I do is just to earn meals. Back then, I needed to feed my kids, even if profit was low - it was enough to get by.”
Her customers are mostly familiar faces. Some have been eating her food since childhood. Even after they get married and move away, they often return for the taste of her cooking - a link to their past.
Nguyen Thi Hien, 66, is one of them. “Her food tastes just like home,” she says. “I especially love the dried fish and stir-fried shrimp - dishes that are hard to find these days. Even though I’d already eaten today, I passed by and couldn’t resist coming in.”
For many, it’s not just the food that draws them back, but Huong herself - her resilience, her warmth, and the comfort she brings with every dish.
Vietnamnet.vn
Podcast
.svg){kind=icon}
