Vien Tuyet Hoa - Delicious Vegetarian food

In the old days vegetarian food only appeared in the mid – July festival (for foreigners ) but now vegetarian food has become part of the culinary culture of the Vietnamese people.

In Ha Noi during the past ten years a lot of vegetarian restaurants have opened up to serve the culinary needs of local and foreign diners. Nang Tam vegetarian restaurant was the first one in Ha Noi. Its owner, a passionate vegetarian chef, said that the purpose of eating vegetarian food was not only to satisfy one’s hunger or practice one’s religion, but also to avoid disease. Before opening the restaurant she went to many pagodas throughout the country to pick up cooking know-how. Among more than 60 vegetarian dishes that the restaurant now serves, Vien Tuyet Hoa is the dish most favoured by diners, especially foreigners. This dish is made from vegetables such as potatoes, pachyrrhizus, field mushrooms, cat’s ears and vegetarian pie. Despite its ingredients, diners, and surprised by its appearance and mistake it for salted food. Making salt dishes is difficult, making vegetarian food is even more challenging. In order to make delicious vegetarian food, the chef must know how to choose the appropriate ingredients. Potatoes must be round with thin skin and must be carefully treated beforehand, along with the other ingredients. What’s more, there are some cardinal rules in making vegetarian food and these are that the chef must be clean and relaxed while cooking  and the environment must be hygienic. This comes from the origins of vegetarian food, which were to practise one’s religion or worship the Buddha, so everything had to be completely clean.

Potatoes after being hard-boiled and flattened are mixed with the ingredients and additives and then fried. Frying is the decisive step in rendering the specific flavour of the dish and it requires skillful heat adjustment to make the dish crispy without being burnt.

In the Mid-July festival, you will feel content when talking about life and enjoying the amber “ Vien tuyet hoa “ dish with the flavour of field mushroom, the taste of fried potatoes, the crispy cat’s ear and the sweet taste of pachyrrhizus.

Source Travellive