PLENTY OF CHOICE: Ordering food online has become popular since dine-in services were banned. Photo courtesy of Hồng Vân Nguyễn

While social distancing regulations have yet to be imposed in Hà Nội, with dine-in services shut citizens have started to limit their travel to just the necessities.

When you have to run some errands or work in a job that cannot be done from home, ordering food for your family and online grocery shopping has never been so easy.

Sit safely at home, if you can afford to do that, and order online. Unlike clothes shopping when you cannot be sure if the clothes fit you or if the material is what you thought it would be, ordering food gives you the impression that there are decent people out there, who need to make ends meet and care about what they do.

Breakfast traditional style

You can order fresh rice pancakes or prepared meat buns wrapped in fresh wild dong leaves for breakfast.

I've found a supplier, whose Facebook name is Hong Van Nguyen, to make great tasty bánh giò with pork from pig farms that get fed with medicinal herbs.

Priced at VNĐ100,000 for five or VNĐ180,000 for 10, it's a great choice for a family of four or five to have for breakfast or as an afternoon snack.

Delivered ready-made, you just need to boil or steam them for another 20 minutes to have them cooked and hot to serve. One plus point is that they make the buns average size, so you can have one and it's enough for everyone in the family even growing children or your ageing parents.

If you want some noodle soup and don't have time to make the demanding broth, prepacked noodle soup with egg noodles and meat and shrimp dumplings at VNĐ260,000 per set is a great choice. It's for four adult portions, so if you have a small child or two, there's enough to share.

Lunch and main course cooked 

If you already had a good breakfast, lunch can be light and easy, so for some bread and meat or fish stew order from the Facebook page Bản Rum, which also offers tasty roasted pork.

TENDER: Pre-cooked pork roasted for home meals from Bản Rum. Photo courtesy of the sho

Bản Rum also has fresh vegetables to make some salad or veggie soup, though the price is a little bit higher than what you would purchase at the market as the shop has shipments from northern Cao Bằng province every week.

Dinners and special trays

A complete one-man meal can be ordered from the Facebook page Vui Cùng Hà Béo, where a full dish of rice with beef, chicken, ribs or BBQ meat and veggies can be ordered at VNĐ60,000 per dish.

A vegetarian menu that has dishes from tofu, Sichuan tofu with eggplants (VNĐ140,000) or vegetarian fried rice with pineapple (VNĐ150,000) can be found on the Facebook page SIGN by A1, which offers restaurant-quality food made by Vietnamese young graduates in tourism from abroad. 

SIGN by A1 also offers hotpot (from VNĐ249,000) with different options including Thai broth pot with US-imported beef, mustard greens pickled with beef or tomato-based hotpot, where you can dip assorted meat or seafood of your choice. VNS

Meat buns @https://www.facebook.com/hongvan.eco

Pre-packed noodle for four @https://www.facebook.com/groups/494777351724385

Cooked food, roasted ducks and other Cao Bằng delicacies @https://www.facebook.com/thuymocban

Full dish for one and hotpot to go @https://www.facebook.com/signbya1