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Thursday, October 05, 2023

Kem Tràng Tiền - Ice Cream in Hanoi with a History of Over 60 Years @ Vietnam

Mention ice cream in Hanoi and locals would definitely know of this brand known as Kem Tràng Tiền; kem means ice cream whereas Tràng Tiền was the street for which the original store started operations, back in 1958! 

This was the same street that gave the ice cream company its name. Devoid of vehicular traffic as it was the weekend for which most roads in the Hanoi Old Quarter district were closed to motor vehicles.

For an ice cream shop, it did had a grand facade and I was excited to find out what's the setup like beyond this arched entrance with overhanging fairy lights. 

It opened up to a courtyard and for the pragmatic Singaporean, all I could think about was "what a waste of space"! On second thought, maybe it was built that way; unconventional with the focus on their ice cream which you can have standing up, or even while walking to another area. 

Queue was a tad long.
And I am an impatient monkey.

Photo spots for customers who were either enjoying their ice cream or waiting for their family / friends to come back with the ice cream. As it was quite crowded, I didn't take that many pictures.

Classic ice cream on cones and there's also the popsicle option which was cheaper at just 12,000 dong (67 Singapore cents). The cone ones were pricier at 15,000 dong (84 Singapore cents).

If you feel like having other Vietnamese desserts (caramel flan, black sesame paste etc), Kem Tràng Tiền had a counter selling them too. Business appeared to be bad though. 

Got my scoop of yam ice cream on cone from another counter outside Kem Tràng Tiền. No idea why customers were giving the counter a miss since the ice cream offerings were the same! 

Ice cream was nice with a pretty strong yam flavor and not terribly sweet. I didn't like the cone though as it was hollow and it paled in comparison to Kem Tươi Plo, which we had earlier on the same day. 

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Address
35 Tràng Tiền, Hoàn Kiếm, 
Hà Nội, Vietnam

Map
As above. 

Menu
As above.


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