In the spiritual life of Vietnamese people, Tet Nguyen Dan (Lunar New Year Day) represents a fresh start for family, community and the whole nation. No matter how humble a family is, they prepare a hearty banquet to pay respects to ancestors and welcome their relatives home.
In the past, all markets were closed on New Year's Day. Therefore, people usually cooked foods in advance that could be preserved, using methods such as sun-drying, grilling with sugar, fermentation and careful wrapping. Despite differences in soil and weather in many different areas, a typical Tet meal contains square chung cake and the rounder tet cake. Chung cake is typical of the North, while tet cake is more common in the South.
Each regions also has many other kinds of cakes, such as te cake (rice cake) or rang bua cake in the North, to cake and la cake in the Center, and it cake in the South.
Several varieties of jams, as well as pickled items are also typical Tet treats. The North has pickled onion, the Center has pickled vegetables and the South has pickled bean sprouts or leek. Traditionally, a tray for Lunar New Year includes four bowls and four dishes, while a large tray may have eight bowls and eight dishes. The four bowls include pig's trotters stew with bamboo sprout and pork tongue, dried pig's skin soup, soya noodles and ground pork. The four dishes include chicken, pork, cinnamon and pork pie. More dishes can be added, such as jellied pork, pig's head paste, fried almond, fish cooked with sauce and ginger, kohlrabi salad or water dropwort salad.
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