Sabirama Hoian Cooking Class, Market Tour and Boat Trip

We found this trip on Trip Advisor and decided to book after reading lots of good reviews. We had a private chauffeur take us to the market where we met our guide and chef for the day, Hung. Hung was very friendly, professional and spoke very good English. To begin, she took us to 3 stalls and introduced us to a few local ingredients we would be using later on that day as well as some over typical Vietnamese products you wouldn’t see in the UK. I think because we were with a guide the owners of the stalls weren’t pushing for us to buy things when sampling some of their products so this was a bonus. The market visit wasn’t too long either. After this, we were guided to a boat where we were taken to the cookery school. The boat trip was great. The school is beautifully located in a quiet area of Hoi An nestled between a forest of water coconut trees. Once we arrived we were offered a neck, shoulder and foot massage. The massage therapist was friendly and welcoming however she was a bit distracted… At one stage she took a phone call whilst giving me a shoulder rub with one hand. The cookery course that came after was absolutely excellent. It was very well organised so we didn’t have to waste time measuring and sorting out all of the food prep before hand. We made 4 dishes. Hung is a very talented chef and teacher. We also were shown how to make decorations out of the salads which I thought was a nice touch and long with making rice paper for the summer rolls. The only small thing I would note was we were given a bill for the 2 cans of tiger we ordered when eating our dishes. The pricing for the experience was definitely worth it, and it’s definitely one of the higher end cooking experience services out there. However I think we should have been told we had to pay for the drinks before hand or it should have been included in the cost before hand. Overall, I would highly recommend this experience. At the end we were emailed recipes for the dishes we made. It we extremely well organised and the staff also seemed to really enjoy working for the company too.