Tet holiday meal

Essentially, the traditional Tet feast remains largely the same as it is today, including green sticky rice cakes (banh chung), fatty pork, pickled onions, fried spring rolls (nem ran), chicken, bamboo shoot soup, pork sausage (gio lua), and gac fruit sticky rice (xoi gac). These are the most essential traditional dishes for Vietnamese people, creating a lavish, colorful, and prosperous feast for the new year.

Traditionally, the whole family would sit together to wrap banh chung (traditional Vietnamese rice cakes) and stay up all night to cook them. To this day, this custom is still preserved in many Vietnamese families across all three regions.

Working hard all year, eating frugally to save up for a lavish meal during Tet – that's the feeling many Vietnamese people experienced during the difficult times of the subsidy era.

Nowadays, with improved living standards and greater affluence, traditional dishes remain an indispensable part of New Year's Eve or New Year's Day meals. However, after eating two or three traditional meals with greasy dishes, many people are starting to seek out lighter options like snail noodle soup, crab noodle soup, or pho to avoid feeling overwhelmed by the richness.

Heritage Magazine