Duplicating foreign food experiences?

[foodgeek]

Have you come back to NYC from your travels looking for certain foods and dishes? If so, which foods, and at which restaurants have you had the most success duplicating your foreign food experiences?

[bourdain]

Vietnamese food is fantastic--and there are, I know, plenty of good Vietnamese restaurants in the US. I've eaten at two--one in Minneapolis, and one in Houston--that were nearly identical to meals I had in Vietnam.

But I want to see Vietnam out the window when I eat Vietnamese. I want to smell Vietnam. I want to see women in their ao dais scooting past on their motorbikes, smell durian and fish sauce--look around and see Vietnamese families tearing at their food, smoking 555 cigarettes between courses. It's so much part of the experience. I'm less picky about Japanese--which has been transported fairly well in certain cases in NY for instance--where large numbers of Japanese business people demand that everything be just so--but it just ain't the same is it? So I generally eat what's good--where it's good--whenever possible. Good food of almost every nationality is eadily available where I live--and I partake happily. But I'm not looking for magic when I do. When I find it--like at Salumi in Seattle (real Italian!) I am overjoyed.