One of the things I like most about traveling is the chance to taste a wonderful new style of food that might be different from what I have experienced here in South Korea.
However, there is also a great opportunity to enjoy food that has been brought here from other cultures and has a bit of a fusion twist on it. Vietnamese food has become quite popular here over the years, and there are many different restaurants that offer lots of Vietnamese fare including Pho and Vietnamese style fried rice.
One of the other delicious items that is popular here is the Banh Mi. As I do love a good sandwich, I thought I should definitely try a Banh Mi from a restaurant I saw while shopping called “Le Bunmie”.
Le Bunmie is casual Vietnamese eatery chain here in South Korea, and as you can see from the menu, they offer noodle, rice, and sandwich dishes along with a few appetizers.
As I was in the mood for a sandwich, I decided to try the Pork Banh Mi to see if it was as delicious as the picture looked.
The restaurant was in a food court of a local shopping center, so it had a very open concept, and it was easy to see what the chef was doing. It took about 10 minutes for my lunch to be ready, and I have to say it was worth every second of waiting.
The Banh Mi also came with a drink and an item they call Gold French Fries.
The Gold French Fries were quite tasty! They are coated in honey, and with the saltiness of the fries, it makes for a very sweet and savory treat that I quite enjoyed. They were a little thin, what is called shoestring fries, and definitely needed a fork for me to eat them as they were sticky. But they were delicious!
OF course the star of the meal was the Banh Mi. The sandwich was outstanding. The baguette was crispy on the outside, but it was so soft and fresh on the inside that it was really hard not to go back and order another one!
The Pork Banh Mi from Le Bunmie doesn’t have too much pork on it, but what it did have was very tasty! The meat was marinated, and they also added Sriracha sauce to it, so there was a nice spicy kick to the Banh Mi.
The Pork Banh Mi comes with a lot of lettuce, and cucumber as well. There is also a fried egg near the bottom of the sandwich, which added a nice flavor to the whole Banh Mi.
On top of the Pork Banh Mi were some heavily fried onion pieces. This made for a nice contrast and some crunchiness to the sandwich, and the flavor was not overpowering. Interestingly, the menu picture shows spring onions, but these were deep fried. I wonder if that was a corporate decision or just this particular location?
The bread though really made the sandwich. The ingredients inside were very yummy, but the baguette with the contrasting textures of crunchy outside and soft inside really allowed for a truly tasty lunch. If I knew that the bread would always be this fresh, I would definitely so back to Le Bunmie again and again.