Banh Bot Loc (Vietnamese Clear Shrimp and Pork Dumplings)

My mom actually comes from a family of 9 children and never got past the 6th grade in Vietnam because in order to support the family, she had be in charge of selling our family’s meat and butcher stall a local market near our family’s house, Cho Nhat Tao near Nguyen Tri Phuong and Ba Hat street in District 10 of Saigon. The 6th grade! I think I was busy skateboarding, listening to 80′s new wave and playing nintendo at that age.

For those who have never been to Vietnam, some of the best foods are not in restaurants, but at food stalls in markets or make shift restaurants along the street where they make one or two items and make it with pride extremely well. It was here where she learned her cooking skills to cook for the entire family. She taught my uncle and aunt how to cook and now the both have restaurants in Hartford.

So when my family was over a few weeks ago, it was good to cook with her and learn a new dish because most of the time I’m always calling her about certain recipes or techniques. We decided to make banh bot loc which is another central Vietnamese specialty made of tapoica flour which becomes clear and translucent when cooked. While the shrimp and pork filling in these dumplings are similar to many Asian dumplings, what sets this apart is its characteristic chewiness. While it shouldn’t be jaw-numbing, the chewy and sticky consistency is a textural delight that we love.

There are two major variations of this dish. One is that each dumpling is wrapped and steamed in banana leaf. The other is to boil the dumplings sans banana leaf. The banana leaf certainly adds a nice aroma to it, but is certainly more time consuming and requires a totally different method of preparation compared to without banana leaf

Hue royal dinner

When ecotourism and marine tourism are seem to be in saturated in destination, many tourists started targeting culinary tours for their vacation. Food products Hue "royal dinner" is attracting not a small amount of customers is one example.

There was a king named King Tu Duc who ruled from 1848 to 1883 lived a life of truly imperial luxury: at every meal, 50 chefs prepared 50 dishes served by 50 servants and 50 artists to play music and dance. Since then, royal meal became a kind of special talk (story) in cultural life of Vietnam.

Let’s pretending you are the King, beside you is the Queen accompanied by tens of servants, all wear traditional royal clothes. All the served food is royal including dishes reminding dragon, phoenix, or peacock. They are not only looking so nice on the outside but also taste even better.

Furthermore, there is another crucial feature of Royal dinner, a ceremony with a lot of interesting rules. Before the first drink for the King health, there is a short speech made by servant chief. Everyone has to say "Van tue" (which means “10 thousand year”) to wish the King a long life. The best royal music and dance will be performed by artists coming from Hue conservatory. Nothing is better than enjoying a delicious food while listening to melodious music and having a feeling of being the King. That is why Royal dinner is a must for those who come to Hue, Vietnam. 

Here are some royal dishes

Royal Spring roll & Pheonix pate

Kim qui rice

Kim Long Minced pork around sugarcane

Golden fish

Lotus rice

Fried squid with lemongrass and chilli

Vietnamese sauce

Soy sauce is made from fermented soy beans mixed with a roasted grain, normally wheat. It is infected with a yeast mold and after fermentation begins, salt is added. Yeast is added for further fermentation and the liquid is left in vats for several months and then filtered.

Light soy sauce is thin, salty and light in flavor and is used as a condiment and in cooking where its light color will not spoil the colors of the ingredients, particularly seafood.

Dark soy sauce is thicker with a full-bodied flavor and is used to add color where needed. Generally it is less salty than the soy sauce.

Sweet soy sauce is a dark, sweet sauce made with soy sauce, sugar, and malt sugar. It has a distinctive malty taste.

Insect food in Hanoi

There is a restaurant in Khuong Thuong village, Hanoi, where all cuisines are processed from insects. The restaurant opened in 2002, owned by Mr. Nguyen Tat Kien. Kien said that all cuisines are processed by his mother, who lived in Thailand for many years.
Kien is not present at the restaurant often because he has to travel throughout the country to seek insects.

“Ant-eggs are bought from Phu Tho and Hoa Binh province. Coconut worms and balm-crickets come from southern Vietnam. Bugs and grasshoppers are from some northern provinces. Some kinds of bugs are imported form Thailand. Belostomatid and crickets are bought from Laos. Some kinds of herbs are also imported,” Kien said.
The most special cuisines at his restaurant are those processed from ant-eggs, in the styles of Thai people or Muong and Tay ethnic people in Vietnam.

Kien said he would go to Quang Tri province to learn processing a species of worms that live in cassava trees. He also said that the latest cuisine at his restaurant is fried spiders.
According to a recent work by Dutch scientists, in the next several decades, humans will have to change their eating habits and turn from cattle and poultry meat to insects to protect the environment.
Scientists said that in the near future, insects will replace meat in supermarkets. Pork, beef and chicken are rich in protein but they are the sources of methane, which is more dangerous than CO2 in causing greenhouse effect.

Insects are also rich in protein but they are not as fat as meat and they discharge little CO2. Moreover, insects don’t transmit diseases like blue-ear, bird flu, etc.
With 10kg of grass and vegetables, we can have 1kg of meat of cattle and poultry, while with the same volume of grass and vegetables, 6-8kg of insects can be created.