Southern and past wedding party dishes

Nowadays, every time we go to a wedding reception in Saigon or, more broadly, the entire Southern region, we can easily see the similarity of the dishes; It's almost a recipe with sequential dishes being served on the table, just seeing the first few dishes is that diners can guess what the remaining four years are.

In luxury restaurants, the first item is sure to be a bowl of micro fish soup (often fake fish seem to be) or asparagus crab soup. Ordinary parties also have to have such an appetizer soup, although the material may be a bit lower: the finfish, abalone, sea crabs are replaced with chicken eggs, chopped bamboo shoots, sometimes even quail eggs. Was called the soup of course to be thin, but not as thin as Western soups, our soup is always mixed with tapioca starch, corn starch. So look in the soup we see as there are clouds mixed in the sky, or dragons - phoenix intersection (a little romantic idea). That is why the food processor called the appetizer soup as converged Phong Van or Loan pho. The goal is to congratulate the new bridegroom.

The next dish must necessarily be dry food (without water) and is often referred to as four play dishes. Although four dishes but not served in four different dishes, but four dishes served in one dish. In the old days when using Han characters, this dish was called four buu (four delicious things), including: chicken with boneless slices, shrimp and crab spring rolls, pincer crabs, a cold meat dish (later on chefs simplify with a single of the four items above). Playboy, or appetizer means to go along with the soup, the four buu dishes are served while waiting for the main dishes of the wedding party.

Today's main dishes are usually roasted chicken, roasted suckling pig or seabass, steamed snakehead fish, fried fish or fried gourd in many different ways. But more than half a century ago, in the Mekong Delta, the most popular main dish at the wedding reception with the name of Pinyin is quite picky and Jiang Nam is considered a precious food. turned completely according to the style of the Vietnamese people. Now this dish is almost no longer present on the banquet table, especially the wedding party, but it is a quite unique dish, thought to be restored.

The name Giang Nam wild crane - Meaning a crane bird perched on a field of Jiangnan (a province in the south of the Yangtze River in China, where there are fertile fields like the southwestern part of our country) - also adopted by his father we call it the golden bowl bowl Buu or the phoenix bowl pearl (meaning yellow chicken or phoenix with eight precious dishes). Inside the name heard "majestic", but monumental indeed, on the table plate is a young hen turned gold, under the chicken belly are dozens of accompanying food (bowls or bowls - eight dishes delicious, precious): eggs, crayfish, crab brain crabs, pig intestines, sausages, sausages, dried meat, bamboo mushrooms; and then on the bamboo shoot is a layer of eight eggs (more likely, depending on the number of diners at each banquet table) called young eggs, made of a compound of minced dried meat, pomegranate sausage, meat shredded sea crab, onion, Mushrooms or cat mushrooms, add the seasoning and then form the pellets into a small chicken egg, wrapped around a piece of pork intestines to clean, then bring fried. Then another layer of bamboo shoots, another layer of egg but this time it is an old egg, made of finely chopped crayfish mixed with chopped tubers and flour, rolled into balls and wrapped in pork intestines, fried. Another layer of bamboo shoots, another layer of eggs, but this time it is an omelette, made of chopped pork liver mixed with black beans, sesame seeds, soy sauce, coconut milk, lime leaves or laksa leaves and pork brains and also wrap pork intestines and fry them. There must have been a hatched egg. The top layer of the egg is the hatched egg, or the egg, which creates this egg, which is removed by cursing the eggshell, opening a hole just enough to fit into a golden sparrow or goose. Scrambled eggs are also served with bamboo shoots. Add the seasoning and then form the pellets into a small chicken egg, wrap around a piece of pork intestines to clean, and then fry them. Then another layer of bamboo shoots, another layer of egg but this time it is an old egg, made of finely chopped crayfish mixed with chopped tubers and flour, rolled into balls and wrapped in pork intestines, fried. Another layer of bamboo shoots, another layer of eggs, but this time it is an omelette, made of chopped pork liver mixed with black beans, sesame seeds, soy sauce, coconut milk, lime leaves or laksa leaves and pork brains and also wrap pork intestines and fry them. There must have been a hatched egg. The top layer of the egg is the hatched egg, or the egg, which creates this egg, which is removed by cursing the eggshell, opening a hole just enough to fit into a golden sparrow or goose. Scrambled eggs are also served with bamboo shoots. Add the seasoning and then form the pellets into a small chicken egg, wrap around a piece of pork intestines to clean, and then fry them. Then another layer of bamboo shoots, another layer of egg but this time it is an old egg, made of finely chopped crayfish mixed with chopped tubers and flour, rolled into balls and wrapped in pork intestines, fried. Another layer of bamboo shoots, another layer of eggs, but this time it is an omelette, made of chopped pork liver mixed with black beans, sesame seeds, soy sauce, coconut milk, lime leaves or laksa leaves and pork brains and also wrap pork intestines and fry them. There must have been a hatched egg. The top layer of the egg is the hatched egg, or the egg, which creates this egg, which is removed by cursing the eggshell, opening a hole just enough to fit into a golden sparrow or goose. Scrambled eggs are also served with bamboo shoots.

In a nutshell, the chicken above is placed in an unfolding position to cover all the eggs below, as if incubating. This just implies that there will be a wedding to give birth, but the number of eggs is so much symbolizing happiness and abundance. A blessing too nice!

When eating, the chicken (which has been chopped into small pieces and pinned together with toothpicks) is picked from piece to piece; next is each egg dish, one for each. Because it is eaten with boiled bamboo shoots, it is not boring. After all, it's fried rice, Kim chung buu bowl literally means the main dish for the party because it includes rice in it, instead of fried rice or hotpot with noodles as later. Serving at the same time with kimchi is usually a dish of water, either islet (later called hotpot) or pork stew with pickled radish or stewed five fruits (five fruits, tubers: jujube, lotus seeds. Tubers energy, ginkgo, millet or something else instead).

The end of the wedding party is a dessert, as it is today, consisting of cakes or fruit.

In particular, there are taboos in the menu of the Southern Vietnamese wedding party, which anyone who is rich or poor, must remember to avoid: sour soup, bitter soup and fish sauce. Although the South is the birthplace of all kinds of fish sauce with things made from delicious sauce such as intestinal sauce, braised fish sauce and vegetables (today is hotpot sauce), but never in the wedding menu sauce. The reason is simple: on the wedding day, people are incompatible with things that evoke bitterness, sourness and stench (though the sauce is delicious but still a strong smell). Similarly, grilled snakehead fish is one of the specialties only in the South, but it is never present at parties or weddings, while steamed fish does. People abstain because the image of the grilled fish symbolizes the bad luck.

In the old days, no matter how rich the rich were at the wedding reception - usually cooked at home - there were also the items listed above, the owner wanted to show his wealth and wealth on other expensive items. Today, most wedding weddings are placed in restaurants, the dishes vary a lot, but the order in which they serve is not much different.