Cam Ranh, Vietnam

Cam Ranh on Vietnam's south-eastern coast is full of surprises from morning markets to unique temples and mango farms. On this food tour we explore street food stalls, sample tropical fruit and learn how to cook classic Vietnamese dishes like Pho and Bo La Lot. Come along as we share what we discover!

Christine Nguyen turns around when we arrive at the market. She explains that everyone sitting back and relaxing are partaking of Vietnam's coffee and breakfast culture. Breakfasts are never eaten at home here, instead they're eaten out at cafes on the way to work or eaten on the backs of motorbikes on their way to work. Your budget dictates where you go for your morning repast.

Christine is the creator and founder of Zazen travel and her enthusiasm for all things Vietnam is infectious. Her market tour and cooking class is booked through the Alma Cam Ranh.

We spend the first stop of our Zazen food tour walking through the markets. Christine is a regular here and the stallholders call out questions asking her where her visitors are from. "Op!" is Vietnamese for Australian and we hear her answering them with "Op!" while we dodge motorbikes and watch vendors selling everything from fresh fish, meat, che sweet soups, vegetables and seasonal fruit. Currently mangosteen and rambutan are in season along with enormous fuchsia pomegranates.

She makes a stop at one stand where a woman is selling fish cakes. These are made out of a local fish and are mixed with herbs and flavours like lemongrass and lime to create snack sized fish cakes. She buys some for us to try and they're delicious.

Then she stops at a stand selling Che or sweet soups. I absolutely love these and always buy them in Sydney. She asks me to pick my favourite one and they serve it up in a cup with freshly roasted peanuts and coconut milk with a knotted pandan leaf inside. It's divine, the rice balls filled with sweetened mung beans.

Christine shows us some cardboard effigies - some are of cars, motorbikes or clothing. When someone passes, you burn the effigy which is said to be like giving them the item in the afterlife that you may not have been able to afford in this life.

Once we've walked through the market and reached the end, I express an interest in a stall selling Banh Can, crispy little coconut rice flour cakes. We take a seat, order some Vietnamese coffee and a "bear matcha milk" which is bear brand condensed milk matcha.

We sit on the low plastic chairs for our own breakfast culture ritual. These mini pancakes have egg in the centre, for a breakfast version of the street food stall snack. These ones are made with small chicken eggs and because she has cooked them on charcoal earlier, they still retain a wonderful crispiness to them. The dipping sauce is made with pineapple juice, fish sauce, water, chilli and spring onion and we dunk these into the sauce for the best breakfast one could ask for. We sit back and enjoy the sound of the birds and market activity.

Our second stop is at Cam Lam to visit a unique cobblestone temple. More than 90% of the temple is decorated in cobblestones. The story starts 30 years ago where the area was largely farmland. A monk asked for the locals to give him money to build a temple but instead they derided and insulted him.

He was undeterred. The cobblestones were free as they were found in rivers but he still needed to buy cement. He started earning a bit of money by chanting mantras and this allowed him to buy the cement needed. Slowly the locals started to see his progress. Impressed, they helped him with advice on how to achieve the temple of his dreams and after his 26 year project was completed, the result is a truly incredible temple with almost every surface covered in detail with cobblestone down to the intricate roof details. He still lives here to this day with his dog and is in his mid 50's.

Our third stop before returning to the Alma Resort is to visit a local mango farmer. Christine shows us the rings cut around the trunk of the mango trees. Usually mango trees produce one crop of mangoes a year but by cutting the rings into the trunks, the mango trees can have several harvests a year.

For her tours, Christine chooses a different farm depending on what they have growing at the moment. And at this farm we aren't the only ones interested in mangoes. Vietnamese people on holidays visit the farm to buy kilos of fresh mango as gifts to bring back home. Here they grow a Vietnamese mango as well as an Australian mango that she calls a "red apple".

We try both types of mango along with some chilli salted dried mango. The Australian mango is huge and sweet and reminds me of coconut while the Vietnamese mango has a kaleidoscope of flavour from sweet, salty and sour.

"Would you like to catch a mango?" Christine asks smiling and holding a long bamboo stick with a net at the end. She explains that you first make sure that the mango is in the net and then use the sharp knife shaped like a bird's beak to cut the stem. Mr NQN goes first - she gives him the taller mango high in the tree and he catches it quickly. Mine is lower down but is in amongst a lot of foliage. I manage to do it too and get ridiculously excited.

After Mr NQN finishes eating both mangoes (probably with images of wintry, rainy Sydney in his head) we head back to the resort for a bit of a rest before we start the cooking class at Atlantis restaurant at noon.

Today we are learning how to make three things: Vietnamese fresh spring rolls or summer rolls, Beef wrapped in Betel leaves of Bo La Lot and Pho Bo or beef noodle soup. Christina and Chef Ben start by showing us the ingredients that go into a Pho broth and then explain that we will get our own sachet of spices to take home with us.

We then learn how to roll spring rolls like a pro (and I will share tips on how to make this along with some amazing dipping sauces!). Then we get to rolling the betel leaves and filling them with the beef and pork mince that we've mixed up. Lastly we make the peanut hoi sin dipping sauce. I've shared the recipes for these fresh Vietnamese summer rolls and two types of dipping sauces here.

After this we take a seat for our lunch. It starts with the summer rolls that we rolled up that are absolutely delicious. The real revelation for us is the Bo La Lot. Sometimes I've had it and it was ok but not something I order a lot. These are absolutely delicious and I'll try and recreate these at home.

Then we have a big, steaming bowl of Pho with all of the seasonings from chilli sauce, oyster sauce, lime, chilli and fresh salad.

Dessert is fresh fruit with a spiced salt made with a little bit of prawn that really gives the fruit a real spectrum of flavour - the saltiness brings out the fruit's sweetness.