"Special tet cakes have a long and meaningful history and remain Vietnamese tradition for Lunar New Year."There are two integral types of savory cakes in the traditional Vietnamese Tet (Lunar New Year) celebration: chung cake and tet cake. Though very different in shape and size, both are made of glutinous rice, fatty pork and mung beans and wrapped in green banana leaves. As legend has it, chung cake was invented at the very dawn of the country when Prince Lieu, the son of a Hung King, selected the choicest ingredients of the wet-cultivation civilization to create a culinary symbol of his country. Tet cake, on the other hand, was created long afterwards in association with the southern territorial extension of Vietnamese migrants. Geographically, chung cake is unique to the North, home to rural areas that were established millennia ago, while tet cake is southern, reflecting the claiming of newfound lands in the South and territorial extensions of migrants.
Cultural researchers assume that chung cakes and their square shape complement round rice buns in reference to the "round sky and square earth" conception of the universe held by the ancient Vietnamese. However, no one is able to explain the significance of the tet cake. I am a Hue native and a descendant of migrants who left behind their homeland to populate the frontier land of the South over seven centuries ago. For me, the legacies of tet cakes are always linked with "the pole of the nation" by my ancestors during their territorial claims. Thanks to their toils, Vietnam acquired the shape it has today. The "national pole"of the center bears resemblance to the hard life of every Vietnamese mother who sustains the two ends of the country, the North and the South.
Unlike chung cakes that will perish after a short time, tet cakes are durable and can be left intact for even a week without losing their original taste. This was an invention of migrants as a solution for their mobile lives. During wartime, southern people lost their festive joy for many years because of military conflicts; tet cake were the only delicacy of Tet they could take for solace in those turbulent times.
Why the name tet? Many assume that the elongated shape of the cake allows cutting and peeling ( tet), thus its current name. The dictionary explains that all three words Tet (Lunar New Year), tet (tet cake) and tiet (period) were derived from the Chinese word. The word has various meanings, including Lunar New Year holidays. Hence, tet cakes can also be understood as the "cake of Tet holidays;' despite the fact that locals in the Center and South consume the cake all year round.
From the quintessential cake of migrants that was made of glutinous rice, tet cakes evolved into a specialty of Tet holidays when filled with fatty pork and green beans; they are also a sacrifice on ancestral altars in New Year celebrations and a formal, familiar food offered to visiting guests on Tet holidays, memorial ceremonies or weddings. In many impoverished regions in the Center, tet cakes were not filled with pork and green beans
but instead red beans stuffed into white glutinous rice.
Chuon village in Hue, also known as. An Truyen Village in Phu Vang D1str1ct, is known for its tet-making traditions. Nowadays, the village's specialty is on sale all year round, although Tet holidays are still the peak sale season of this renowned culinary village. Its tet cakes are made out of the sticky, quality glutinous rice of Dinh. According to historical accounts of the Nguyen Dynasty, the court each year required hundreds of top-notch glutinous liquor jars to sacrifice to Heaven, Earth and the deities in New Year sacrifices as well as to ancestors in memorial ceremonies. Thus, the court had the Ministry of Internal Affairs select superior glutinous rice species and assign liquor-making villages in Thua Thien Province to be dedicated to the king. An Truyen Village in the southeast of the Citadel was among the recipients of these superior glutinous rice species for liquor making and emerged to be the best-known liquor making village in the capital. Fertile fields of this peaceful village were sufficient not only for supplies of rice to make ceremonial liquor, but also for the making of the village's signature tet cakes, colloquially known by the name of Chuon Village.
When year-end rains temporarily cease and farm work is over, Chuon Village enters the peak season of tet cakes. Lush green banana leaves are spread across large sieves to be cleaned of their pollen. Men chop bamboo trees to make strings. Women sort out rice grains, soak green beans and slice pork to prepare the fillings. While the making of chung cakes largely relies on molds to shape the square cakes, tet cakes require years of experience to produce a perfectly cylindrical shape. In the last week before Tet, villagers are busy rolling banana leaves, pouring green beans, stuffing fillings and wrapping cakes as fires smolder day and night. The quality and shape of final products depend on the tying. Bamboo strings are tied in pairs at a finger knuckle's distance, which also dictates the size of each bite before being peeled off.
Two days before Tet (December 30th of the Lunar calendar), tet vendors from Chuon Village travel throughout Hue to sell their products for the year end Tet eve feast. After ceremonies, tet cakes are taken from altars, peeled open and served with pork and fermented cabbage for the last reunion dinner of the year; this meal signals the conclusion of the whole year and welcomes the spring.
Tran Duc Anh Son
