It's been a few weeks since I've stepped foot out of the city, and surely, every place in Viet Nam has its own distinct delicacies.
Our first stop was Can Tho and not the city, mind you. We visited my uncle in-law's family in Hau Giang Province, which is about 20-30 minutes from downtown.
Local delicacies included snake and field mice.
The snake was slow-cooked into a stew. I found it a bit difficult to eat since there wasn't much meat but a lot of small bones that one could easily choke on. The texture was chewier than chicken for sure and the color a kind of beige-grey.
I skipped on the fried field mice.
Since Hau Giang is located so far off on its own, its people make do with fresh local produce.
The main dish was hotpot. Instead of the usual greens, a different kind of watercress was used into combination with squash flowers and another (the name doesn't come to mind at the moment). I liked how the flowers still had a crunch to them, even after having been dipped into boiling soup.
Being the late risers that we are, a good portion of the water market vendors had dispersed by the time we arrived in Downtown Can Tho.
Each vendor hung their product on long sticks to indicate what they were selling.
After the market, we stopped off onto an island for lunch.
Candied kumquats, used to cure sore throats.
Sea snails before preparation.
Cooked with ginger, lemongrass, and fresh coconut milk.
Banana tree. Nothing ever goes to waste, as almost every part of the tree is utilized in some way, whether in cooking or other purposes. The reddish/pink flower is sliced into thin strings as garnish in many Viet Namese dishes. Banana leaves are, as seen in many Asian cultures, used as wrapping for storing and cooking food.
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Onward to Kien Giang!
It was the first time I'd done a homestay in a (very) rural area. It's simplicity was a refreshing break from city life. We showered with water pumped up from a well. Also, I slept under a mosquito net for the first time in my life. They say that without one, the mosquitoes would have sucked me dry (although Saigon mosquitoes have already done a pretty good job at that).
This is my uncle chopping up sugarcane. As I've come to know, there are different types of sugarcane. Either because they are too old or just plain too hard, most sugar cane found in Saigon this month is just used for pressing. The sugar cane in Kien Giang, however, was young enough to be had as a snack. During my last trip to Viet Nam, sugar cane was more or less the only thing I was snacking on all and every day.
Preparing fresh crab for boiling.
Even rural areas have modernized (a bit). In these photo, you can see a partial water pump mechanism. For those who can afford it, a motor can be used to pump up water instead of the old hand-pump mechanism. It saves a lot of effort and is much more productive.
Fresh shrimp caught in the backyard!
Our Kien Giang stay was short but truly eye-opening. The biggest problem that I saw was the amount of lead contamination in the local water. The only source of close to drinkable water that these people have are derived from wells, yet the grounds are seeped with lead. They do as much as they can to filter it, although it is evident by the locals' skin condition that the problem still remains.
