Dừa tấc
Pasteur street into District 3
(see directions below)
*****
There’s a place in Saigon where you can enjoy a truly refreshing, thirst-quenching drink without ever getting off your motorbike.
Dừa tấc – a delicious iced coconut juice drink
And luckily for Hai and I, it just happens to be on our way home from Saigon’s city center.
Simple, delicious and cheap! That’s the combo that drew in over two dozen motorbikes during the first 10 minutes we sat and enjoyed our dừa tấc drink here yesterday afternoon.
Dừa Tấc
Dừa tấc is a refreshing coconut juice drink spiked with a twist of nước ep quả tắc (quả tắc fruit juice), sugar, a pinch of salt, and ice. Quả tắc is a tiny citrus fruit, intensely sweet and tangerine-flavored.
Coconut juice drink spiked with zest of quả tắc (tiny tangerine-like fruit)
We sipped away at our drinks, watching the pleasant young female street vendor and her helpers work curbside at the small mobile fruit juice production stand. She worked at a frantic pace and successfully kept pace with the crowd’s non-stop requests for their drinks.
Across the street, two other women sat harvesting fresh coconut meat from inside the shells of a small mountain of fresh coconuts. The subtly delicious slices of fresh coconut meat were dropped into the bottom of each glass. Then, the fresh coconut juice mixture and a few brightly colored zest strips from the quả tắc, were poured over the coconut meat and crushed ice in each glass.
There were other drinks available, including a coconut/pineapple blend, but by far, the dừa tấc is the main event here!
So, come by and grab a small plastic stool and cool down! Or, as most patrons do, take your dừa tấc in a small plastic bag with a protruding straw, and enjoy your afternoon or evening drink sitting on your motorbike.
Just 6000 vnd (30 cents usd) per glass, have two! They’re delicious!!
This is a quick and easy YUM on any day you find yourself hot and in need of a yummy cold drink.
Serving up drinks from 10:00 a.m. to 10:30 p.m.
From Saigon’s city center, head north on Pasteur street into District 3. Shortly before getting to the end of Pasteur street (about street no. 254), look for the street vendor at the curb with a slew of young folk straddling their parked motorbikes, chatting away, and sipping on straws directly across the street from Techcombank. (She’s just a few store fronts down from Phở Hòa for those who might find themselves at that popular tourist eatery – not yet reviewed by Eating Saigon!
Curbside dừa tấc vendor on Pasteur street
View Dừa Tấc in a larger map