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Ready-made rice cakes prove popular during Cold Food Festival

VOV.VN trên Google News
VOV.VN - Residents of Hanoi buy bánh trôi (floating cake) and bánh chay (small balls made from green bean paste wrapped in a shell made of glutinous rice flour) for the Hàn Thực (Cold Food) Festival which falls on the third day of the third lunar month, or March 31 this year.
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From March 31 morning, trôi and chay cakes are sold by shops throughout many of the capital’s wet markets.
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In addition to the floating cakes, traders are also offering Phu The (conjugal cake), Chung cake, sticky rice, and boiled chicken for customers to worship their ancestors during the festival.
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A plate of Bánh trôi and a bowl of Bánh chay costs anywhere from VND15,000 to VND20,000 (equivalent to US$0.59 - 0.78)
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Besides selling pre-boiled cakes, traders also sell fresh dough for making cakes. These dough packages already include all of the ingredients, customers just need to knead dough with a brown palm sugar cube inside and roll it into small balls, which are then dropped into boiling water.
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Roses, along with betel and areca, are also popular items for many customers to offer on the ancestral altar during the Cold Food Festival.
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A full set of offerings costs around VND170,000 (equivalent to US$6.65)
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According to Le Sinh, an owner of a shop selling Trôi and Chay cakes, her business consumes about 100 kg of rice powder each day in order to make the floating cakes.
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She says her family often stay up all night for cake making to meet the demand of consumer these days.
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According to a local resident, Trôi and Chay cakes are part of the Vietnamese legend of Mother Âu Cơ.
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Trôi cake represents the 50 eggs hatched to become 50 female children following Mother Âu Cơ opening land in the mountains,
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....while Chay cake represents the other 50 eggs hatched to become male children to follow their Father Lac Long Quan that went out to sea and expanded the borders to build a thriving country.
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Over the years, the custom of eating Trôi and Chay cakes has become a unique cultural tradition of the Vietnamese people, passed down through generations.
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