Yen Bai – a land of mountains and forests in the Northwest with specialties, many visitors will love to visit. The simplicity in the way of cooking, the purity and nature of each spice, and the enthusiasm of the chef, all make up a list of Yen Bai specialties of the mountains.
1. Tram Tau Chili Shoot Tram Tau
Chili Bamboo Shoot is only available in the upland district of Tram Tau, Yen Bai province, processed from Lay bamboo shoots – a plant that grows only in the high mountains. This is a very special kind of bamboo shoot, the size of the bamboo shoot is small as the size of the finger, the inside is thick in the intestine called chili bamboo shoot.
Mang Lay in Tram Tau grows a lot on the slopes of rocky mountains. Every fall in the autumn, when the back of the pass began to be covered with dew, it was also the time when shoots sprouted. For H’mong people in Tram Tau, chili bamboo shoots are one of the indispensable dishes in the simple meals in the fields or in hearty meals on holidays and Tet.
How to make chili bamboo shoots is simple. Bamboo shoots are peeled and cleaned with warm towels. This is not a matter of saving water, but it is because this type of bamboo shoots, if dipped in water, will darken, look unattractive, delicious, when the bamboo shoots are cleaned, they will be placed in a pipe or a jar to keep bamboo shoots. Each turn, bamboo shoots are sprinkled with freshly pounded chili mixed with white salt. The spicy or salinity depends on the preference of each family. When bamboo shoots are full of tubes or jars, they are compressed with stones. About 1 month after soaking, the bamboo shoots can be eaten.
When it is soaked in white salt and fresh chili for a long time, it will have a pinkish white color, just looking at it is very interesting. At this time, if you put it in your mouth and take a bite, you will find the chili shoots very crunchy and at the tip of the tongue, you can feel the sour, spicy taste blending together to create an unforgettable taste.
Tram Tau chili shoot is a popular and familiar dish of the Mong people in Tram Tau. Although made from small bamboo shoots, when harmoniously combined with familiar ingredients such as salt and fresh chili, it creates a very special taste, so even once enjoying Tram Tau chili bamboo shoots is also difficult to forget. go for that taste. If you have the opportunity to come to Yen Bai highlands, visitors do not miss this unique specialty because it will help you feel the taste of the greatness encapsulated in each chili bamboo shoot.
2. Honey from Mu Cang Chai Forest
To travel to Mu Cang Chai , Yen Bai province, in addition to admiring the majesty of Khau Pha pass, Thac Mo, the poetic beauty of La Pan Tan terraced fields in the ripe rice season, visitors also enjoy specialties bearing regional cultural characteristics such as mussel, black chicken, paddy wine, wild bamboo shoots, cat apple, tamarind plum … In which, wild honey is a specialty that many tourists choose to bring. gift.
Mu Cang Chai honey is one of the specialties of Yen Bai province. Thanks to the abundance of hundreds of forest flowers, the bees in Mu Cang Chai have refined pure, golden, concentrated honey, blending the aroma and the quintessential sweetness of the mountains. This is the type of honey that bees nest in caves, tree hollows, bees find and suck the nectar of wild flowers, so they are completely pure, golden, thick, pure sweet, not crystallized. It also has a very good health and healing effect. Pure honey is poured out, until all the honey is gone. A common hive gives 3 – 5 liters of honey. The hive is seasoned and is the largest containing up to 10 liters of honey.
Mu Cang Chai forest honey Yen Bai is a precious specialty of the mountains and forests, and has become a famous brand that many people love and buy to use and as gifts.
3. Mang Sat Mang Sat
shoots in many localities, but not everywhere they are delicious, perhaps Yen Bai is a land with soil and climate suitable for the growth and development of bamboo shoots. That is why Yen Bai bamboo shoot has become the dish voted by many gourmets as the most delicious and attractive dish.
Bamboo shoots are in season, especially at the end of February and early March of the calendar year. The shoot time is only from March to April every year. This type of bamboo shoots belongs to the bamboo family, with very small straight stems, shoots as big as sickle-hilt, white, soft and sweet, growing naturally. This type of bamboo shoots is abundant in the hilly areas of Tram Tau and Van Chan districts, but mostly in Nghia Lo town.
Bamboo shoots have a sweet and soft taste, are easy to prepare dishes, suitable to the taste of many people, they are best eaten when the new shoots are plump, the white body still smells of forest land. Choosing delicious bamboo shoots, you need to know how to cook to have the most attractive delicious dishes. Bamboo shoots can be processed a lot of dishes such as: boiled dishes, braised dishes, stir-fried dishes, grilled dishes …
Bamboo shoots are boiled, fried and then braised with duck and garlic, served hot with pepper, onions, The smell is very strange. Small chopped bamboo shoots, soaked with chili vinegar, chili peppers must be much and spicy, and can be bottled to eat gradually and also bring rice and taste.
4. Bird Banh Bao
Called specialties because of the sophistication in the way of making cakes and the story about the cake is meaningful of motherhood. The old story said that, in March during the upland season, the women and sisters were busy working all day to collect fruit and seeds without home. Working in the fields, but the mother always looks forward to the children waiting for her. While resting in the fields, Dao’s mother took advantage of these forest coconut leaves to weave bird cake shells, to return home at the end of the day to stuff rice to make cakes for her children. The falcon cake is like a maternal gift for her children.
The cake is wrapped in a shape like a small, small and medium bird. People call it generally bird cake. To make a unique cake, glutinous rice is the main ingredient that is indispensable in the chimney cake. In addition, the cake can also add many ingredients such as green beans, leaves, ash, and pork to create a unique, diversified and delicious flavor. In addition to sticky rice, bird cakes must have raw materials of pineapple leaves, a plant very familiar to Yen Bai people. The leaves are green, the shape is long. When wrapping, people will knit the leaves together to cover the filling, then drop the cake in the pot and then boil it. In addition to making raw material for wrapping the bird’s cake, pineapple leaves are also medicine to cure stomach diseases, which many families bring to plant around the house to make medicine. Buffalo cake is a specialty of the Dao and Cao Lan ethnic groups in Yen Binh district. The cake represents family love, represents father and son love, represents mother and child love. People here often bring this cake when going to the fields to temporarily use lunch or make food for children to go to school. This is a popular and popular dish of the local ethnic group. In particular, the donut cake is given as a specialty to share feelings with each other, is a precious gift for the mother for that children love.
5. Tan Tu Le
Glutinous Rice, also known as Tan La sticky rice (in Thai language) is a specialty sticky rice only available in Tu Le Valley, Van Chan, Yen Bai. Nghia Lo, going to Tu Le, Mu Cang Chai will feel the freshness of the climate, the majesty of the mountains and hills and the kindness and hospitality of the Northwestern people.
Tu Le sticky rice is classified as one of the most delicious types of sticky rice in our country, and turns into sticky rice with a sweet and sticky aroma, leaving each seed but not sticking together like most other types of sticky rice. Tu Le sticky rice, also known as Tan La sticky rice (according to Thai language) is a specialty sticky rice only available in Tu Le valley, Van Chan, Yen Bai. The sticky rice here is very delicious and fragrant, famous for its wings. The rice fields are irrigated by the Muong Lung upstream stream, rice is planted on a rare earth, thin weathered layer, high potassium concentration, Tu Le valley is nestled between three high mountains, Khau Pha, Khau. Than and Khau Song should fluctuate the temperature during the day, while the night time is longer than the day. In addition, the structure of Tu Le soil is spongy, easy to absorb water and the climate is clean, favorable for the natural development of rice, so Tan La sticky trees grow down to take on young green roots. Therefore, Tan Tu Le sticky rice is considered clean rice and has a very strange fragrance. What is more special is that there is no place to grow this type of rice, but for fragrant, pliable rice like the Tu Le valley.
6. Mu Cang Chai Three-Flower Plum Mu Cang Chai
Mu Cang Chai is not only famous for terraced fields and wonders created by human hands, famous for its colorful upland markets, but also captivates tourists. customers by the rich, crunchy flavor of Tam hoa plum. Not only because it is delicious but also a specialty that many people love because the fruit is big, red, the flesh inside is bright pink, covered with a smooth white chalk.
With the specialty of Mu Cang Chai Tam flower plum, you just need to wash it or enjoy it right in the garden. terraced fields, the peaceful Hmong villages nestled on the edge of the cliffs, but also enjoy the crisp, cool sweetness of the plum plum to forget the thirst and fatigue after the journey throughout the mountains and forests, the same message.
7. Shan Tuyet Tea Suoi Giang
Shan Tuyet tea area in Suoi Giang is spread over an area of about 393 hectares, of which the area of natural trees is 293 hectares, mainly in the villages of Giang Cao, Giang B, Pang Cang, Tap Lang I. , Tap Lang II, Suoi Lap … with more than 40 thousand trees with the age from over 100 to 300 years. Ancient Shan Tuyet tea has a trunk the size of a few embracing, musty white color, tree canopy about 20m² wide, dark green leaves. earth, sky, so tea buds and leaves are very big, dark green, covered with a thin layer of fluff like snow. That’s why the tea is called Shan Tuyet.
During the tea processing season, Suoi Giang is fragrant, the scent of tea leaves is softened by the heat of cast iron pans, wood firewood. Tea sap is so fragrant and seductive that in the seasonal aroma of tea, people have a feeling that the bottom of their throat also tastes a lot. It is true that a kind of tea is very watery, very flattering, after drinking it, the residue of the scent of that mountain forest still lingers on the tip of the tongue.
Coming to Suoi Giang, Van Chan district, Yen Bai province, visitors will be immersed in four seasons floating in the clouds, enjoying the sweetness of ancient Shan Tuyet tea, of pure honey and the sound of the sound, flute, sound lips and love lyrics of the boys and girls calling out.
8. Luc Yen banana cake
For a long time, banana has become a close tree, sticking with the Tay Luc Yen people, because of the benefits from banana tree. The Tay people have innovated to recreate the elegance and attractiveness of banana flavor by processing into a delicious product – banana cake – containing spiritual values passed down from generation to generation and used. making sacrifices on occasions when families and clans have great things.
With banana cake, the attractiveness is shown through the skillful and skillful hands of mothers and mothers. The cake is made mainly from bananas and a little fresh rice flour. In order to make a delicious banana cake, to keep the intact banana flavor, yellow cake color like dipping honey, they must prepare quite meticulously since the bananas are released. Ripe bananas, peeled, then dried to save. When making cakes, dried bananas are soaked in warm water to soften and then ground into flour, rice flour must also be ground with banana powder and mix well to make cake crust. To have sweet and fragrant cake, the chosen ingredient is banana pepper; If you want the cake to have toughness, bright colors, choose banana leaves, banana leaves … depending on your preference.
The attractive thing about the banana cake is that in addition to the bean filling, the peanuts, and the remaining sugar, the additives are all from the banana. The leaf wrapping the cake is also from the banana leaves in the garden, the wire wrapping the cake is also from the banana rope just like any cake. That’s why the banana cake is easy to enjoy, delicious and strange, attracting visitors from near and far.