We are going to Hanoi (and possibly Hoi An) next month and am interested in Vietnamese cooking classes. Has anyone taken cooking classes they would recommend in either place? Any suggestions?
Thanks, Mike

We took the Hidden Hanoi cooking class in Hanoi and the Red Bridge Cooking class in Hoi An...both very different format but enjoyed both.

barefootbeach, could you describe the difference in formats?

In Hanoi you can also attend the cooking class at HoaSua school.

In HIdden Hanoi, we started with watching part of the movie "The scent of green papaya." We went down to the cooking room and were each assigned one item to prepare. Our instructor Linh was cute and delightful. She would help each of us and we'd watch the other's prepare something at times. The class was held about a 15 min taxi ride away from the Old Quarter, and started with an optional market tour, that we passed on.

in Hoi An, we started with a market tour (while I didn't think we learned much during the tour, it did offer a great way to take photos close up without hassle) Then, took a delightful 20 min boat ride up the Hoi An river to the Red Bridge restaurant. It was set up lecture style with work stations along the back, in an outdoor pavilion. (Hot but bearable...not as bad as the cooking room in Bangkok's Blue Elephant school)

BTW, we really enjoyed our walking tour of Hanoi's Old Quarter that we also did with Hidden Hanoi with Anh as our guide.
This class was more of a "show"...the chef was sardonic and demonstrated each dish...then we'd go back and prepare it from the ingredients...very little actual cooking. This was followed by eating our preparations (and a whole steamed fish that we didn't do) in their restaurant...followed by another boat ride back.

Both of these classes were not as good as Bangkok's Blue Elephant's class, where we did more hands-on cooking.

I wrote more about these and included photos in my trip report "SE Asia: It's so hot" that was posted in April, if you want more details. I thought all of them were a good value for the money. Hope this helps.