Go to Tay Ninh to eat vegetarian food.

Vegetarian dishes are not only light and healthy but also visually appealing.

From simple vegetarian dishes

Tay Ninh is considered the cradle of Cao Dai religion, with a large number of followers. Like other religions, Cao Dai in Tay Ninh guides people towards goodness and away from vice. And vegetarianism is one of the basic rules for Cao Dai followers. Followers must observe a vegetarian diet for 10 days a month or practice vegetarianism permanently. Therefore, the number of vegetarians in Tay Ninh is arguably the highest in the country.

From regularly practicing vegetarianism, the people of Tay Ninh have creatively transformed vegetables and fruits from their gardens into simple yet incredibly attractive and unique vegetarian dishes. Just young banana plants can be used by vegetarians to make salads, sour soups, or stir-fries with turmeric. During cashew season, a few fresh cashews, along with okra and tomatoes, are enough to make a sweet and sour soup, or for a change of pace, there are cashews braised with lemongrass or cashew sauce…

The famous vegetarian spring rolls of Tay Ninh are made from pomelo peel.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Thi (67 years old, residing in Truong Dong commune, Hoa Thanh town) said that she has been a vegetarian for over 30 years. Because she has been a vegetarian for so long, she frequently changes her meal menu to avoid boredom: sometimes it's turmeric stewed with salt and dipping sauce, sour soup with giang leaves and okra, or lemongrass stewed with soy sauce, stir-fried fermented soybean paste, boiled banana blossom with fermented soybean paste... All are vegetables readily available in her garden.

“With just a young jackfruit from the garden, I can make many dishes. The simplest is to eat it raw, peel it, slice it thinly, and mix it with herbs to make a salad. A bit more elaborate is to boil it, then mix it with fried oil, peanuts, and Vietnamese coriander to make a salad to wrap in rice paper, or to braise the boiled jackfruit with fresh coconut water or coconut milk to make braised jackfruit. When it's the season for the wild mangosteen, I dig it up from the backyard; most of it is ground into flour, mixed with a little seasoning and green onions, and fried – that's another new and unique dish,” Mrs. Thi recounted.

For vegetarians, if you don't have much time to cook, you can just go to the market to buy some dishes. In Tay Ninh, almost every market seems to have vegetarian food vendors. The Long Hoa Market Commercial Center (Hoa Thanh town) has the most. Here, the dishes are more diverse and abundant. There's fermented fish paste made from white radish, papaya, cucumber, and pineapple; fermented pork sausage made from pomelo peel; roasted pork made from flour and bread; bitter melon stuffed with tofu, and tofu skin rolls…

Vegetarian fish sauce (also known as vegetarian Thai fish sauce) is made from papaya, red radish, white radish, cucumber, pineapple, etc.

Ms. Phan Thi Thu Thao, a resident of Truong Dong commune, Hoa Thanh town, who has been selling vegetarian food at Long Hoa Commercial Center for over 10 years, said that she only orders the tofu herself; all the other dishes she sells are made by her family. During the day, she sells at the market, and in the evening, she and her husband stay up until midnight to prepare everything for the next day.

"I sell every day. But on vegetarian days, the sales are double compared to regular days. And especially in the last days of the twelfth lunar month, almost every household buys vegetarian food to offer as a sacrifice during the three days of Tet. Most people here are religious, so vegetarian food is quite easy to sell," Thao said with a smile.

Fermented soybean paste – a familiar dish for vegetarians in Tay Ninh.

In Tay Ninh, vegetarian dishes are readily available everywhere, even on non-vegetarian days. From humble vegetarian eateries offering surprisingly cheap meals starting from just 12,000 VND per plate with generous portions of rice and other dishes, to long-established vegetarian restaurants with diverse and frequently updated menus. Even stalls selling vegetarian noodle soup, rice noodle soup, vermicelli soup, and vegetarian porridge are always bustling with customers.

Go to a local vegan restaurant.

Mr. Ngo Tran Ngoc Quoc – Vice Chairman of the Provincial Tourism Association – commented that vegetarian cuisine is a unique and distinctive feature of Tay Ninh that needs to be developed and highlighted as a key attraction for tourists. Vegetarian cuisine is also closely linked to spiritual tourism, particularly with two major tourist destinations: Ba Den Mountain and the Holy See. We must ensure that tourists are deeply impressed by the idea that "you haven't truly been to Tay Ninh if you haven't tried vegetarian food."

Vegetarian salad is made from a variety of vegetables and fruits.

Anh Quoc shared: “On one occasion, when a delegation of foreign guests came to Tay Ninh for research and they wanted to enjoy our vegetarian cuisine, I asked the ladies at Tri Hue Palace to cook it for them. The foreign guests were very pleased and found it very delicious.”

They praised Tay Ninh's vegetarian cuisine as extremely unique, and upon parting, they said: "You possess a great treasure: vegetarian cuisine. Preserve and develop it so that the world may know about it." This further fueled my determination to build a vegetarian restaurant to promote Tay Ninh's vegetarian culinary heritage to everyone.

Crispy fried cassava is a unique and rustic dish of Tay Ninh people.

His plan, which he had been nurturing for 10 years, gradually took shape. Since the Mid-Autumn Festival this year, Phuoc Lac Vien Eco-Restaurant (Dien Bien Phu Street, Tay Ninh City), featuring authentic local vegetarian dishes, has officially opened. The restaurant has a menu of approximately 200 dishes and a capacity of 600-800 diners.

Vegetarian dishes are prepared from fresh ingredients.

“All the dishes at the restaurant are prepared by chefs I sent to learn from traditional culinary artisans in Tay Ninh. After the chefs returned from their training, about a year ago, we held a weekly cooking demonstration program to invite the elders and officials from local Cao Dai communities to sample the dishes and provide feedback.”

"The vegetarian dishes of the people of Tay Ninh are all made entirely from natural ingredients, using fresh vegetables and fruits, and especially without using pre-packaged products. That's what makes Tay Ninh vegetarian cuisine different from other places, and it's also what our Phuoc Lac Vien eco-restaurant wants to introduce to everyone," Mr. Quoc shared.

Vegetarian Vietnamese pancake

Vegetarian snakehead fish is made from tofu skin and seaweed.

The UK added that Vietnam Airlines had recently asked him to provide some images of his restaurant's vegetarian dishes so that Vietnam Airlines could promote them on its flights.

“This is a way to bring vegetarian cuisine to a wider audience across the country and the world. However, I alone cannot do it; I need the collective effort of all the people of Tay Ninh. I believe that when everyone cares about vegetarian cuisine, preserves and honors it, the vegetarian dishes here will not only be simple food but also a heritage of our Tay Ninh,” Mr. Quoc said.

On December 31, 2020, the Provincial People's Committee sent công văn (official letter) No. 3349 to the Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism requesting that "Vegetarian Culinary Art of Tay Ninh Province" be included in the National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage.

The Provincial People's Committee has determined that this is a unique form of folk cuisine of Tay Ninh province, representative of the community and local identity, passed down through many generations, and voluntarily protected by the people of Tay Ninh.

Ngoc Dieu - Hoa Khang

Source: https://baotayninh.vn/ve-tay-ninh-an-chay-a129667.html