An Giang Specialties

Phu My Phong cake (glutinous rice chupatty)

The Phu My trade village of Phong cake has formed, existed and developed for nearly 70 years. Phu My Phong cake is as small as a dish but becomes bigger than a bamboo tape fan after being baked. The cake is spongy and soft. It sounds good to bite the cake because of the greasy taste of glutinous rice, the sweet taste of sugar, the scent of milk, sesame, soy-been, peanut etc. which makes a specific taste and it is integral in the meals on Tet (lunar new year) holidays or in a dinner, wedding. If one has an occasion to visit An Giang, Phu My Phong cake is an significant gift for tourists to bring back and give to relatives.

Chau Doc mam (salted fish)

Mam is one of the most popular dishes in the Mekong delta. But it is in Chau Doc where mam is shown its plenty as an original kind of food. Chau Doc mam becomes a special product of An Giang province. By visiting Chau Doc market, a tourist can easily see more than 30 kinds of mam. Some kinds can be instant after adding some raw materials such as shrimp paste, Thai mam, ba khia (small sea crab) mam, mam tom (another kind of shrimp paste), mam tep (tiny shrimp paste), mam cong (fresh water small crab). Some must be processed through many stages such as mam sat, catfish mam, mam loc (blackfish sauce), anabas mam, mam tren, mam ca linh, mam ca chot, mam chuot, mam ca com (anchovy), mam ca thieu, mam ca long tong (rasbora), mam ca me vinh, mam ca tren la, mam ca tren mo, mam ca tren bau. Arriving in Chau Doc, tourists often buy mam ruot which was made initially from gut and spawn of ophiocephalus maculates and thus became rare.

Delicious food in Bay Nui (Seven mounts) Area

Visiting Bay Nui area in An Giang, there is also a delicious dish called Soc-rice spaghetti (cooked with shrimp, crab or meat) in Vinh Trung commune besides some famous dishes such as rice gruel with beef in Tri Ton district and mam of many kinds in Chau Doc. The Soc qualitative rice of Bay Nui is tilled by Bay Nui Khmer community in the field surrounding mountains feet. The rice flour which makes the rice spaghetti curve is also supple, scented and tasty.

Tri Ton rice gruel with beef in An Giang

Bay Nui beef is delicious because of careful rearing. Therefore, tourists who come to this area always enjoy incomparable palatable dishes processed from beef. The famous and delicious food is beef stir-fried with Vang leaves. By visiting Nha Ban, tourists can enjoy a dish of beef stir-fried with Vang leaves and full “tu hu” in a satiable way. Coming to Tri Ton town, tourists will enjoy a both familiar and strange light meal of rice gruel with beef. Besides leisurely chewing rare reddened thin slices of beef which are put on the top bow of rice gruel, they also enjoy the taste of tripes.

Porpoise of Lower Mekong river

The porpoise is processed into 4 dishes. The first and simple one is grilled porpoise meat. A little bit more sophisticatedly is propoise meat cooked with brine in a container. The pungent spice of ground pepper, the sweet of porpoise meat, the fatty taste of propoise fat, the salty of salt and fish sauce and the sweet of sugar all are mixed to become a wonderful taste in our mouths. It is unknown when we feel full to have this dish with rice. A hot pot of porpoise meat and nematode rice is a dish both to have in a meal and to have a drink when friends gather. How wonderful it is to eat this dish with clean vegetable of sesbania sesban flowers. The sweet of the fish and the crispy taste of sesbania sesban flowers which are mixed with the sour taste of nematode rice all make the meal interesting. Sesbania sesban flowers which are tossed slightly in vinegar are suitable to have with porpoise meat cooked unsaltedly with young early tamarind. This is also a dish both to have in a meal and to have in a drink and amazes tourists from afar!

Palm milk

Cold palm includes palm milk and palm pulp. The palm milk is taken from its flowers. This is a tree growing up a lot in the area. The fresh pure palm milk tastes sweet. Palms which are plucked in a bunch are then splitted for pulp to be frozen. Palm pulp tastes fatty, tasty and has good smell.

Antelaea azadirachta salad

It is a pity for someone not to have antelaea azadirachta salad when coming to Long Xuyen of An Giang. This is only a unique dish in Long Xuyen. The softly bitter taste of antelaea azadirachta leaves with the pig’s ear boiled and sliced, dried trichgaster pectorakilis meat torn to pieces, some shrimps scalded in boiled water, green mango sliced into small pieces, liquid mixture of salty sweet sour pungent tastes. South Vietnam has many salads that all have sufficient tastes: salty, sweet, sour, pungent, which are forgotten easily. But the pungent bitter sweet buttery tastes of antelaea azadirachta salad will not be forgettable.

Pickled young mango in An Giang

Cat Chu young mango is steeped in salty water and later in alum water for being crispy. Mix the mango with refined sugar and expose it to the sun for one day and put it and capsicum into a vase for steeping. This pickled mangro is crispy with both bitter and sweet tastes of sugar and salt. The pickled young mango is a popular specialty appearing recently in Cho Moi district of An Giang province. Biting a piece of pickled young mango tastes both crispy and bitter without any more sour taste from the young mango. Besides it also has sweet taste and salty taste, which surely makes tourists a wonderful feeling when enjoying it.

Dried inflating pangasius hypophthalmus meat which tastes good and sounds strange is a famous specialty of Chau Doc

Unlike other dried foods, dried inflating pangasius hypophthalmus meat is only for frying not for grilling. In order to have a piece of dried pangasius hypophthalmus meat fried inflatedly with crispy scented and fatty tastes, frying it with cool water is the most original. Pour water into a pan and then boil and put the dried pangasius hypophthalmus meat into it. Before the water becomes dry, turn the dried pangasius hypophthalmus meat back and forth for several times, which makes the meat inflate and look golden, scented and fatty.