Tamarind flower salad for a change of taste in summer

Want to eat sour fish sauce

Wait for the flood season to eat to your heart's content.

Folklore has had folk songs to help people easily remember the time markers of the specialty, like if you want to eat "sour bần", you have to wait for "rising water". But before the round bần fruits are served, from summer, the purple bần flowers have already been served.

People say that the mangrove tree has "green leaves and white flowers, but when you get close, it doesn't smell good" to describe the tree's unfortunate fate: it has nothing to attract you. But now the tree's fate has changed when the mangrove flower salad was born.

The annual flood season begins around the 7th lunar month, depending on whether the water level comes early or late, the time varies slightly. During this season, the water rushes down to the lower Mekong River, and the trees of the Ca Na and Banyan trees curl up on their branches. And only in the middle of summer, around the 3rd to 6th lunar months, the branches of the Banyan trees start to bloom and bear fruit.

Tamarind flower salad with shrimp

The flowers of the Barringtonia acutangula are bisexual, meaning they have both pistil and stamen. People only harvest the stamens to make salad and leave the pistils. Partly because the tree pollinates to produce large fruit, and partly because if the pistils are left in, the salad will be bitter.

When the flowers are still in bud, they cannot be harvested immediately. We have to wait for them to bloom a little bit, at which time the stamens will be long and delicious. The flowers of the Banyan tree begin to bloom at midnight. Around 3-4 am, people go out to pick the flowers because when the sun rises, the wind blows, birds perch, and bees buzz, causing the stamens to fall off and cannot be collected.

Wash the harvested stamens and drain. Then prepare a bowl of sauce with a little saltiness and aroma from fish sauce, a little sweetness from sugar and a little sourness from vinegar. To make this dish delicious, you need to add the rich flavor of some freshwater shrimp.

Watercress salad has a slightly sweet and sour taste.

Some people eat the salad with beef, pig ears, or shrimp. I especially like to eat it with shrimp. People in Tra Vinh call it "tép bát" or "tép bò" - "tép chong" is the same thing. The bigger the shrimp, the tougher and sweeter the meat.

Wash the shrimp, boil them, take them out, drain them, peel them, and remove their heads. Then mix the lotus flowers and shrimp together, add the sauce, and the salad is complete. And remember to add a few herbs for fragrance, and a little peanuts for a rich, fatty taste.

The Bần flower salad has a slightly sour and sweet taste, with a faint aroma of pollen remaining on the Bần flower. Add the crunchiness and juiciness of the Bần flower, the fragrant smell of straw in the shrimp, and the light fat of peanuts. Anyone who has eaten it once will remember it forever.

Source: https://nld.com.vn/du-lich-xanh/goi-bong-ban-doi-vi-ngay-he-20230504211530508.htm