We’ve posted about eating dog before. We went to a local restaurant in Saigon a couple months back that specializes in dog meat (or “doggie” as they call it here). Serene ate it by accident that night and was pretty upset. I tried it at a dinner party and I have to say, it was quite delicious. It’s not something I’m planning on eating on a regular basis, but I’ll try anything once. But in Northern Vietnam, it’s a lot easier to find on the menu…
I first noticed the difference from south to north when I saw “thit cho” on a lot of the signs. My Vietnamese is practically non-existent but I do know that this is the phrase for dog. Once I had seen it a couple times, I started looking for it and I realized that it’s found all over the place up here. In Hanoi, there’s a 1km-long district of dog meat joints. There’s definitely a stronger prevalence for dog-eating in the north.



I am quite happy that the dog meat I accidentally ate did not like your “after” picture. I probably would have cried.
A friend told me that the Viet Cong ate dogs and any animal really- rates, mice- during the war because they had nothing to eat in the jungle. They would have brought this habit to southern Vietnam. Maybe that’s why dog food is still more popular in the north than in the south.