Because we had such a blast at our Thai cooking class & bc Vietnamese food is my fave cuisine back home, we decided to do a Vietnamese cooking class in Hoi An. It was a different but equally lovely experience. I do think Vietnamese food is generally much more difficult to cook than Thai food bc not only are you making the dish, you’re also making a different sauce to be served w every dish. Perhaps the coolest thing we learned was how to make fresh rice paper… It’s akin to Italians making fresh pasta as the difference vs store bought is night & day. But it’s a long process. Given 2 of the best local Vietnamese restos are within a mile of my place in Chicago, I’m unsure of the practicality to trying to make these dishes on my own but I do think the rice paper would be a great party trick.
We made the following along w accompanying sauces:

– Pancake, wrapped in rice paper

– Papaya/mango salad w shrimp & squid

– Spring roll including fresh rice paper

– Quang chicken