My taste buds got revoked a bit extremely in Cairns, Australia when I splurged on the Vietnamese curry at a street food outlet in the Night Market.

As such it was a priority to make it myself on the return and it turned out too good.

Vietnamese chicken curry and rice was my lunch at least 80% of the office days when I was working with Standard Chartered Bank in HongKong.

The rest 20% were mostly on the Dim Sum floor, where I accompanied my all women direct reports for an extended, noisy lunch of the best Dimsums in the world.

Trained at short lunch breaks, I couldn’t go there alone as some Cantonese was required to order anything myself for a quick bite.

The Vietnamese outlet was on the 2nd floor of Cityplaza 2 in Taikoo Shing (the overcrowded dim sum floor with ladies carting the dim sum wagons through the aisle on the third) where I had my office on the 16th.

‘One Chicken Curry Rice’ the guy at the counter used to shout, the moment I step on the floor.

Here I followed the recipe literally, except for the Vietnamese Chilli Powder, replaced by the Indian one.

And I wished I had some fresh lemon grass pods instead of the dried ones we have. Lemon grass and fish sauce give the curry that unique flavour.

A hearty lunch of the two of us finishing most of it and I am sure to make it again and again.