Special food in the Centre Vietnam

Banh beo xu Hue (Hue bloating fren-shaped cake)

Banh beo is a specialty and indispensable in Hue City.Banh beo is delicious with its core stuffed with small shrimps and sauce made from a mixture of fish sauce, sugar, garlic, chilly and fresh small shrimps, watery grease. Therefore, it offers customers with sweet, buttery and smelling flavors. Without delicious sauce, the cake would become worthless. When serving, it is required to use a tool called Que Cheo (bamboo folk) to pass through the cake, cut into pieces, prick and eat. Customers would be impressed forever with having Banh beo in a green garden while listening to Hue folk song coming from the Perfume River.

 Bun bo gio heo (Beef and fork soft noodle soup)

Preparing Bun bo gio heo is very skillful. Pig leg is clean-shaved, chopped into even slices with adequate bone, meat and skin, mixed with lean beefs, and soaked with salt, pepper, fish sauce, dry onion and spices. 

Bun bo gio heo is proper with all appetites. Even diet people could enjoy the sweet-smelling of beef with less fat of pig leg so as not to be fed up with as serving. Bun bo gio heo is delicious anytime you have it. You could enjoy this specialty of the Central region on Hue City.

 Banh la cha tom (Grilled rice cake with Cray fish)

Anyone who used to experience the dish would never forget such simple cake made from grilled rice cake and Cray fish only.

The cake must be as thin as a leaf but flexible enough. Cray fish must be brittle and sweet. Serving with long jawed anchovy sauce.

Banh la cha tom does not as heavily smell as the majority of the other dishes but gentle, elegant and attractive to customers

 Com hen song Huong (Perfume River mussel cooked rice)

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. You have to arrive to Hen river-islet in the Perfume River to have the original Com hen. However, you can find out the dish on some streets inHue City. It requires 15 different raw materials to prepare for the dish, including mussel, fried grease, watery grease, peanuts, white sesames, dry pancake, salted shredded meat, chilly sauce, banana flower, banana trunk, sour carambola, spice vegetables, peppermint, salad, etc.

Com hen is always attractive to many customers because it is tasty and, at the same time, economic to anybody.

 Cao lau Hoi An (Hoi An vermicelli)

Cao lau as a dish has its "own kingdom", therefore, customers are likely to be served with it only in Hoi An.

Cao lau noodles are carefully made from local new rice not stocked one. Water used to soak rice must be taken from wells in the Ba Le Village; noodles thus will be soft, enduring and flavored with special sweet-smelling. In addition, meat used to prepare for Cao lau must be loin or trotter.

Dry pancakes used must be thick and have much sesame. Greasy coconut quintessence and bitter green cabbage are also indispensable. The so-called genuine Cao lau Hoi An must satisfy all above requirements.

 Banh trang cuon thit heo (Dry pancake roll with pork)

Coming to the Central region, you are offered with the service of Banh trang cuon thịt heo.

A big plate of fresh vegetables with a peppery-hot red chilly, a plate of boiled lean and fat meat, a bowl of fish sauce, and a plate of dry pancakes are displayed on the dining table. Customers have to serve themselves with all of the 10 substances mentioned above.

Banh trang cuon thịt heo is considered as not only a daily dish but also likely an artistic specialty of the Central citizens.

 My Quang (Quang soft noodle soup)

Similar to rice noodle and chicken or pork soup (Hu tieu),My Quang is a variety of Pho (rice noodle soup), because the noodles are made from rice and soused with soup as serving. The soup sauce, which is added, comes from a mixture of flavor from beef or pork bone, shrimps, crabs, chicken and duck. The noodles are yellow, somewhat distinct from Pho. However, the main reason for having this color is to be in hannony with the colors of shrimps and crabs.

The best My Quang is made from rice in Phu Chiem, shrimp in Cho Dai and spicy vegetables in Tra Que. As a strict selection of substances to prepare, My Quang has been dominant in almost all of culinary markets in the Central provinces and expanded to Ho Chi Minh City with a high qualification of a Quang Ngai's specialty.

Second Da Lat in Central Highlands

Also with cold weather, pine forests and mansions nestled in the morning dew, Mang Den is like the second Da Lat city in the majestic forest and mountain of Central Highlands.

The pine trees in Mang Den.

In the language of Bana people, Mang Den means the large and flat land. Located at an altitude of 1,200 m over the sea level, Mang Den becomes the ideal place to hide the heat and wind of the Central Highland, with an average temperature of 18-20 degrees C all the year round. About 50 km to the northeast Kon Tum City, Mang Den has a wild, pure beauty like a young woman sleeping in the woods.
On the basalt trail leading to grandeur Mang Den, anyone would mistake like being lost in the romantic landscape of Da Lat. Located between the winding passes of Mang Den and Violak, Mang Den hides itself in the primitive forests, creating a spectacular natural picture.
Mang Den Pass gives visitors shocking, refreshing feelings before the majestic scenery. Especially in winter, there are times when cloud covers the entire pass. At the peak of the Pass, visitors feel ecstasy by the beauty of the landscape of high mountains, dense forests…
While rare red pine trees are disappearing in Da Lat, Mang Den is surrounded by endless stretches of red pines. Mixed in that vast blue are songs of the forest, which are harmonized the sounds of waterfalls, water and birds.

The magical beauty of Pa Sy waterfall. Photo: kontum.org.vn.

French villas in Mang Den. Photo: kontum.org.vn

Tourists can walk to the waterfall as Pa Sy, Dak Ke, Lo Ba to enjoy the love songs of the mountains, or simply stroll around the idyllic lakes such as Toong Zori, Toong Po and Toong Dam to feel the quiet moments in the nature. If you are adventurous, you can cross the forest watching blooming orchids.
Mang Den also has French style villas like Da Lat. Lovely scenery with fresh air in this place turns this place into an ideal place for those who want to feel relaxed in mind. Here visitors are also immersed in the sounds of gongs and enjoy ruou can (wine drunk out of a jar through pipes) near fire.
Not only linking Kon Tum with Quang Ngai and provinces in the central coast, Mang Den is also seen as the start of the tourist route "Highland Green Road," connecting to the "Central Region Heritage Route" and the "Ho Chi Minh legendary road" to form the trans-nation tours. These traits are enough to make Mang Den’s own place in the heart of tourists, not only known as a “shadow” of Da Lat city.