Rice Snail Pancake – Eat Best Food in Ben Tre
Banh xeo (pancake) is a popular delicious cake of people in the North, Central and South regions in Vietnam. Each region has a different way of making banh xeo from ingredients, cake size to dipping sauce, with its own unique local characteristics. For the people of the South, banh xeo is not simply made from bacon or silver shrimp, but also combined with rice snails to create a unique flavor, bearing the imprint of the Mekong Delta river. If Dong Thap is famous for Cao Lanh pancakes, Ben Tre attracts tourists with rice snail pancakes.
By Thomas Vietnam at vemekong.com | All Best Foods & Restaurants in Ben Tre
1. Better to Know as a Food Lover
Find them: Ben Tre city.
Best time: Dusk-Dawn
Don’t miss: Rice snail pancake
Local’s pick: Hoa rice snail pancake restaurant
Tourist’s pick: Rice snail pancake restaurant in Ben Tre
Blog: /rice-snail-pancake-ben-tre/
Facts: It's called rice snail pancakes because the filling of banh xeo is the sweet meat of rice snails
2. Better to Know Rice snail pancake
Rice snail pancake is a favorite rustic dish of Phu Da people (Cho Lach district, Ben Tre province), especially on the occasion of Doan Ngo New Year (i.e. the 5th day of the 5th lunar month). In the journey to visit Ben Tre, if you have the opportunity to visit Cho Lach, you cannot ignore the famous rice snail pancakes.
It is said to be a rustic dish, but not every season has rice snails to make pancakes. The rice snail season usually starts from April to July of the lunar calendar every year and the most delicious is in the May of the lunar calendar. At that time, the rice snail was fat and round, the meat was full, and it was delicious to eat until it absorbed the tip of the tongue. It is not a coincidence that people in the West in general and people in Ben Tre in particular eat rice snail pancakes on the occasion of the Lunar New Year. The ancients believed that: In the human body, especially the digestive system, there are often hidden insects that live, if not eliminated, the insects will multiply and cause harm to each person. To "exterminate insects" on the Lunar New Year, people often eat fruits, sticky rice or cakes. In the western provinces, the fifth lunar month is also the rice snail season, so the dishes of this day are skillfully and eye-catching, especially rice snail pancakes.
3. Rice snail pancake in Ben Tre
Traveling to Ben Tre without enjoying rice snail pancakes is a mistake. Rice snail pancakes are delicious, crispy, delicious, once tasted, it will be difficult to forget the taste. To make rice snail pancakes, the most important ingredient is rice snails. Before bringing the snails to boil, people often put the snails in a bowl of water to wash the soaked rice with crushed chili peppers so that the snails can release all their sebum. Boiled rice snails take out into a bowl, use a bamboo toothpick or needle to remove the snail meat. Then, stir-fry rice snails with thinly sliced onions and chives, season to taste and taste the delicious pancakes.
For a delicious rice snail pancake, in addition to the filling, the crust is also an important ingredient. First, you have to mix the flour to make pancakes with coconut milk, eggs, turmeric powder and thinly sliced green onions. The process of making pancakes is quite simple, but requires the maker to be skillful and meticulous so that the cake is round and the edge of the cake is not torn. Pour a little flour into the pan, spread it very thin, then add the rice snail filling and roll it up, deep-fry the two sides of the cake. Add chopped cassava roots (beans) and bean sprouts to increase the sweetness of the cake, helping people not to get fed up. Rice snails, milky white meat, and fragrant fat are spread evenly in the heart of the cake. When the cake is done, fold it in half and scoop it out onto a plate. The cake is served with lemon garlic chili fish sauce and raw vegetables such as mustard greens, lettuce, sprouts, herbs, cucumbers...
Rice snail pancake is a delicious dish that visitors should try when traveling to Ben Tre. Visitors can easily find banh xeo shops on the roadside or in eco-tourism areas. A tray of rice snail pancakes is served with vegetables and dipping sauces, attracting diners. When enjoying, put raw vegetables in the palm of your hand, pick up a piece of pancake mixed with rice snail meat and then roll it up and dip it in a cup of lemon fish sauce, garlic and chili, and slowly chew it in your mouth. The sweet and crispy taste of snail meat is mixed with the fatty and aromatic taste of rice flour to form an attractive dish.
4. How to Make Rice snail pancake
Ingredients for making rice snail pancakes
Rice flour
Rice snail
Turmeric powder
Coconut
Water
Bean sprouts, herbs, broccoli,….
Seasoning: Fish sauce, sugar, salt, monosodium glutamate, cooking oil,....
How to make rice snail pancakes
Step 1: Prepare ingredients
Rice snails, when brought back to soak with water to wash rice, let the snails release all the dirt, then wash and put in a pot of water with a little salt, monosodium glutamate, add a little water to boil until the snails are cooked, then take them out. take the snail meat inside. Next, stir-fry the snail's flesh with some thinly sliced onion and chives, then turn off the heat and scoop out into a bowl.
Step 2: Make cake dough
Western pancakes often have the sweet and fatty taste of coconut milk. So when making pancake flour, mix the flour with a little turmeric powder and add some spices including: sugar, salt, monosodium glutamate, coconut milk and finely chopped scallions. Adjust seasoning to taste. The cake batter must have a moderate consistency so that the finished cake has a delicious crispness.
Step 3: Fry the cake
Put the pan on the stove, heat it with a little cooking oil coated with cashews all over the pan. When the oil is boiling, use a patch to stir the dough, then scoop the flour into the pan and coat it all over the pan into a thin layer of dough. Next, spread the rice snail evenly into the cake, add a little sprout, then cover it for about 3 minutes, then open the lid and cook for another minute until the cake is golden and crispy, then fold the cake in half and then take it out on a plate. Do the same until you run out of ingredients.
Step 4: Done
When the cake is cooked, it is placed on a plate with herbs, broccoli and a bowl of dipping sauce. The way to make rice snail pancakes is not difficult, the only extreme step is to soak the rice snails and remove the snail's intestines, but when you enjoy it, you will feel the delicious, crispy, sweet taste of snail meat mixed with the fatty and aromatic flavor of the pancake batter. mixed with sweet and sour dipping sauce.
5. Pro tips:
Here are our tips for easing your mind (and stomach) around food-handling environments that you may not be used to.
Make sure the food is freshly cooked. If you're eating hot street food, it's always safest (not to mention more delicious) to eat food you can see being cooked to order.
Look for lines and busy stalls. Busy street food stalls are an indicator of popularity, and their high turnover rate means the food is never sitting out for hours and developing dreaded bacteria. Yes, long lines can be discouraging when you’re hungry after a full day of exploring, but it’s not worth the risk of grabbing precooked food from the empty spot next door.
Eat when the locals are eating. The last and most important element here is when to eat. You’re likely already on a weird eating schedule while you’re traveling, but it’s important to try and adjust to the eating times of where you are. A bowl of pho might be lunch for Americans, but it’s breakfast for the Vietnamese. This ensures that you’re eating freshly cooked food and that you can find the best and most popular places to eat.
If you can’t drink the water, then you can’t eat the salad. Most people get so hung up on not drinking the water or skipping ice in drinks that they don’t think about all of the other ways in which water is used in food service. Fruits and vegetables tend to be washed with tap water in most places, rather than the filtered water that locals drink—or sometimes it’s not washed at all. If you’re really craving some produce, try fruits you can peel or cooked veggies.
Trust your gut. If you’re unsure about the food or the way that it’s being prepared, then keep moving. Eating street food all over the world doesn’t make you an expert. Every stall and every country are different, and sometimes the rules can be harder to follow. When something doesn’t look, smell, or feel right, don’t eat it! Trust your judgment. Chances are that there’s another spot close by that’s making something more delicious.
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Hopefully, the above tips will help you to come up with a great plan for your adventure in Mekong River Delta, Vietnam. Have a safe trip!
“Sleep less, travel more, respect more” – Thomas Vietnam – Local travel expert.
Thank you
