Hue cuisine inherits from the best food which was drawn throughout Vietnam to serve the King. A distinctive feature of Hue dishes that sets them apart from other regional cuisines in Vietnam is the relatively small serving size with refined presentation, a vestige of its royal cuisine. Another feature of Hue cuisine is that it is often very spicy. Indochina travel Vietnam
Tom Chua (Hue Sour Shrimp)
Sour Shrimp is one of the most sought-after specialities of the old capital of Vietnam. When Hue natives living outside the city return to their homeland, they usually have sour shrimp. Tourists also make sure to buy some jars of sour shrimp before leaving Hue. When they first come to Hue and taste this dish, visitors from other regions must be really amazed and surprised. Unlike normal shrimp sauce (has brown color and smooth surface), Sour Shrimp sauce has orange color while shrimps still keep its original shape. This dish can be prepared with any kind of shrimp but the right Sour Shrimp dish must be made from fresh shrimps living in brackish water. The shrimps must be equally big and round-shaped. First, the cook removes the heads of the shrimps, cleans them by salt water and cooks them by strong rice wine. The shrimps will turn red. After that, carefully mix the shrimps with sticky rice, sliced lesser galangal, garlic and long thin chili pieces. Slowly put all the mixture into a jar covered by guava leaves. The ingredients are kept in a closed container at room temperature for three days. Then the container is put in a cool, dry place. After five or seven days, the sour shrimp are ready. In just one food, you can taste the sweet fleshy of shrimp, the fat and delicious of meat, spicy of chili, garlic, sour of star fruit and wine of banana. Centre Vietnam tours packages
Com Hen (Hue Mussel Rice)
Com Hen is the very simple and low-priced specialty of Hue, the ancient citadel of Vietnam. Accordingly, the way of serving this special kind of food is of great ancient, simplicity and deliciousness. Com Hen has a sweet-smelling flavor of rice, onion, and grease, as well as strange tastes of sweet, buttery, salty, sour, bitter, and peppery-hot.
Hot white rice is part of every meal in Vietnam, but only Hue mussel rice is served cool. Hue people, after deciding that no food should be wasted, have designed this dish using leftover rice. Com Hen contains rice, boiled mussel, star fruit, fish sauce, cabbage, onion, pepper, peanut, chili, and a variety of herbs. Ginger, sesame, and chili are also added to the broth. The specialty is all of these elements are cold. When people eat Com Hen, they add all the above ingredients to a bowl, and slowly add boiled mussel broth with chili sauce into the bowl (the broth is the only hot thing in Com Hen). A delicious bowl of “Com hen” is indispensable chili. The Hue eats every dish with chili. Weather in Hue is cold, the annual rainfall is large so that people have to eat more chili to bitter cold. This dish is very spicy and it is not rare to see people with watery eyes and sweaty faces while eating it; nevertheless, everyone congratulates the cook for such a delicious meal. Com Hen has an extremely spicy flavor as such, so gastronomes remember it just after one time enjoying. The name means “clam rice” — a rather understated label for a chaotic bowl of contrasting colors, tastes and textures: rice, tender stir-fried clams, crisp pork cracklings, peanuts, bean sprouts, julienned green apples, fried shallots and herbs, with a bowl of hot clam broth that you can add as you wish.
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