Finding a place to eat as we travel seems easy today using Google Maps with the attached reviews and photos from fellow travellers. But is it? We have found that these reviews are often fake, that the really good local places aren’t reviewed and don’t appear, and that some reviews are written by customers who know little about how food should be. This is why food tours are always such a great idea, the locals know.
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My husband, in his career as a head chef, likes to say that you can get the best review, and the worst, on the same night. Food reviews are personal. You may like your dish well-done with crispy edges, the next person may be horrified. With Asian food, and reviews written by Westerners, the review process is even more open to variance.
An authentic local dish may not be foreigner-friendly, and a Westernised version may get top scores. Do you want authentic or palatable to Westerners? It’s hard to know what’s what. If in doubt, book a food tour.
On this day, we took a chance, we went with the Google Maps recommendation, and Kung’s Cafe Laos in Vientiane (location here) pleased us and surprised us. As always, we were very happy to pay cash to a small, human owned business, rather than give our money to big companies owned by the super-rich.
Kung’s Cafe Lao
The map took us down a tiny side street. Too narrow for any car. We passed homes, potted plants, cats, lazy dogs and bicycles to the cafe at the end of the alley. It was full of Westerners, maybe expats, maybe tourists like us. Either way, this place was popular and maybe that’s the power of Google Maps. Maybe we should all leave more positive reviews for the smaller places.
The menu was long and in English. It featured eclectic Southeast Asian meals reflective of the many influences and shifting borders of the region.
Chicken was “all gone” for the day, as mum or gandma informed us from the tiny outdoor kitchen.
We both went with beef. I went with a winter beef ragu served with a Laos baguette. The bread in French Indochina has more yeast, less flour. It’s good.
The beef ragu was very similar to a Vietnamese dish we’d tried for the first time on our food tour in Saigon. We’ve spent months, maybe even a full year of our lives in Vietnam despite this there are always new foods to experience.
My son chose a green curry, a dish more often associated with Thai food but you’ll see it on menus all over Laos. It came with rice. Both were good, both were cheap.
Healthy Eating as You Travel
I am a little obsessive with eating right. At home we cook everything “from scratch” although I hate that expression. We use organic vegetables, herbs, fruit, and veg from our own land. We buy no processed foods, we don’t even use supermarkets, preferring to buy our local growers’ and farmers’ produce direct.
On the road, this all goes out of the window. My health took a hit at the end of our 7 years of full-time travel, due to food quality. It’s one of the big negatives of travel. I’ve been very careful with what I ingest ever since.
But on the road, what can you do? It’s hard. Our included hotel breakfast on this January morning was white sliced sugary bread, processed cheese, spam and a fried egg. I could have skipped breakfast and fasted, as I often do. But a free meal is a free meal.
I did skip the spam.
I loaded it with orange chilli sauce and enjoyed. Travel is fleeting and to be savoured, I’ll get back with the program when we are home.
The food at Kung Cafe Laos was fairly healthy. It had meat and veg plus the carbs that I normally avoid. The meat probably isn’t grass-fed and the veg probably isn’t organic. Both are probably full of pesticides and other nasties but until the world moves on from the mass-produced food years, and I think it will, we just go with what we can get.
The Luxury of Budget Travel
Today when we travel, finding enjoyment in everything is coming more and more naturally, afterall everything is an experience and something to learn from. It’s all world schooling at the end of the day. We try to avoid situational grumpyness.
With an abundance mindset, does it even matter if you waste $20 on a sub-par meal now and then? There will be more meals as there will be more money. I’m finding that many things just don’t matter and that we don’t need to take life so seriously.
A hot shower, good air-con, a comfortable bed and no cleaning to be done, are pure luxury. Travel is freedom from chores, freedom to do the things we want to do and see the things we choose to see. Even on the most budget level, travel is a luxury.
Where Did We Stay in Vientiane?
We stayed at a fairly budget hotel that suited our needs perfectly. The wifi worked, the shower was hot, there was a kettle for my instant coffee that I always carry, and we could walk to all of the central attractions in Vientiane. Exploring on foot saved us a small fortune in tour costs (they are expensive in Laos), and boosted muscle mass as we hiked.
Kungs Cafe Laos was withing easy walking distance, as was the mighty Mekong, the night markets (they’re not great), Patuxay, and the most famous Wats.
As I approach my 60th birthday, maintaining muscle mass is very important to me. Which was why I was so thrilled to be able to lift weights as the laundry churned in our last hotel in Vietnam. More on that in coming blog posts.
We visited Vientiane in January 2026, winter, and were thrilled to find cooler temperatures by day, conducive to explorations on foot, and evenings worthy of a light sweater. (Sub 20C). Laos is a great destination for northern hemisphere winter, or to escape the heat back home in summer of the southern hemisphere tropics.
Things To See and Do in Vientiane
You could spend weeks in Vientiane exploring all of the Wats, museums, and attractions, but most tourists don’t. Realistically, you can see everything of interest in 1 day, on foot, with the possible exception of Buddha Park, which is about an hour away by bus, or will probably be included on your tour. You can book a comprehensive tour of the highlights of Vientiane here.
I’ll write a full guide to things to see and do in Vientiane shortly, plus a few other restaurant or food recommendations. Watch your inbox as we dive deeper into Laos in 2026, travel blogging, old-school, by humans, for humans.
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