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CANADIAN CHEF DONALD BERGER PHOTO: AARON JOEL SANTOS<br />
coff ee served with condensed<br />
milk) from the many hole-inthe-wall<br />
restaurants and hawker<br />
stalls along Yen Phu street.<br />
Tay Ho has world-class food<br />
and cocktails. Canadian chef<br />
Donald Berger was one of the fi rst<br />
operators to recognise the area’s<br />
potential. He says that when he<br />
established Vine restaurant there<br />
in 2003 there was little in the<br />
way of development; the area was peppered<br />
with water-fi lled bomb craters and people<br />
said he was “crazy” to open a fi ne-dining<br />
restaurant in a Vietnamese residential area.<br />
Today, Vine Restaurant and its sister<br />
wine and cigar shop Vine Cellar Door have<br />
built a solid reputation. Berger left Vine<br />
to start his own business in 2007, and<br />
the four-storey, glass-fronted<br />
Don’s, set on the lake opposite<br />
the Sheraton Hotel, has become<br />
synonymous with fantastic<br />
international cuisine, from pizzas<br />
and sandwiches to French cuisine<br />
and fi ne wines. Don’s rooftop oyster<br />
bar is a particularly popular haunt<br />
for locals and expats after dark.<br />
TOP/BOTTOM:<br />
Canadian chef<br />
Donald Berger;<br />
oysters at Don’s<br />
Tay Ho has worldclass<br />
food and<br />
cocktails — great<br />
to share over the<br />
latest gossip<br />
HOTSPOT //<br />
Media darling and TV chef<br />
Bobby Chinn is another Tay Ho<br />
resident. A steep rent rise forced<br />
him to relocate his city centre<br />
restaurant, and his boudoir-like<br />
signature bar and contemporary<br />
eatery is now on the shores of<br />
Tay Ho. It’s a mainstay of Hanoi’s<br />
dining scene with a plethora of<br />
loyal patrons booking its rosepetal-strewn<br />
tables. The laid-back<br />
downstairs lounge bar, hung with swooping<br />
curves of red silk and fl oating red Chinesestyle<br />
lamps, is a great place to share a shisha<br />
pipe and the latest gossip over a glass of<br />
wine or a cocktail.<br />
At the kitsch Love Chocolate café,<br />
waitresses wearing Parisian-style<br />
maid’s outfi ts serve chocolaty<br />
delights in a Victorian tea room-<br />
inspired setting. A bright yellow<br />
exterior houses The House of Son<br />
Tinh, where patrons can sample<br />
typical Vietnamese dishes with<br />
home-distilled rice liquors and<br />
rice wine cocktails.<br />
At Mandarin, a pair of<br />
ornate wooden gates leads to Vietnam’s<br />
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