Experience the Top 10 most delicious specialties in Vĩnh Long that you must try

Perhaps blessed by the gentle land and waters, Vĩnh Long offers a unique delicacy: crispy fried elephant ear fish. This dish, with its distinctive and exquisite flavor, is unmatched anywhere else. Whether you're dining in Vĩnh Long's restaurants or exploring its ecotourism sites, you'll be captivated by the sight of this dish presented on a large plate, its aroma permeating the air.

What sets it apart is that the fish remains crispy from cooking to cooling. Its fresh, sweet taste, paired with tangy fish sauce and assorted greens wrapped in rice paper, will leave an unforgettable impression on anyone who savors it.

When in Vĩnh Long, indulge in a variety of delicious fruits, from sour to sweet, small to large, especially the renowned Five Season pomelo in the Southern fruit market and nationwide.

Compared to Bien Hoa or Ben Tre pomelos, the Five Season pomelo boasts a sweet, seedless taste, with plump segments and abundant juice yet remarkably crisp. Sampling a few segments of this special fruit will reveal its unique flavor. Additionally, you can choose Five Season pomelos as gifts for relatives, friends, and family.

Aside from the beloved crispy fried elephant ear fish, grilled snakehead fish is also one of the specialties of Vĩnh Long and the rural areas of the Mekong Delta. In the past, grilled snakehead fish was a simple, rustic dish enjoyed by people living amidst rice fields year-round, but today, this special dish has made its way into eateries ranging from modest to upscale, even becoming a specialty in restaurants and tourist areas in Vĩnh Long.

Visitors can wrap rice paper with vermicelli, add some greens, herbs, and the distinctive tangy dipping sauce to fully enjoy the flavor of the dish. It would be a regrettable miss not to try this dish when visiting Vĩnh Long!

If chưng cake is the specialty of the North, then Tet cake is the quintessential delicacy of the South, especially in the Western provinces. Tet cake in Vĩnh Long is renowned for its triple-filling Tet cake. Though it's named triple-filling, the chefs can add various fillings such as banana, coconut, green beans, and lard to make the cake more unique.

When wrapping the Tet cake, ingredients like dried coconut, bananas, green beans, fragrant sticky rice, dried banana leaves, and strands of banana leaf are used to tie the cake. After wrapping, the cake is cooked until all the ingredients blend together, creating the unforgettable sweet taste of Vĩnh Long's triple-filling Tet cake. Trying this dish is a must when in Vĩnh Long.

Did you know? The craft village of Cù Lao Mây spring roll rice paper in Tan Thanh hamlet, Luc Si Thanh commune, Tra On district, Vinh Long province, has a tradition spanning over a hundred years, operating year-round to serve guests from near and far.

Here, the rice paper is made manually without the use of chemicals, resulting in deliciously soft and flexible rice papers. Examples include nem rice paper, sweet rice paper, and grilled rice paper. Cù Lao Mây rice paper is one of Vinh Long's specialties beloved by many tourists and makes an excellent gift for your loved ones.

Vietnamese pancake is a specialty of the Southern region in general and Vĩnh Long in particular. Anyone who has tried Vĩnh Long pancakes once surely cannot forget its sweet, rustic, and delicious flavor. True to its name, the sizzling sound when pouring the batter into the hot pan is characteristic of Vĩnh Long pancakes. Vĩnh Long pancakes are prepared in various ways, from the size of the pancake to the ingredients for the filling, depending on each person's preference.

Sometimes, people use shredded taro with pork belly and shrimp, which is incredibly delicious, while other times they use fresh shredded bamboo shoots mixed with seasonal mushrooms, or wild betel leaf shrimp with a vibrant golden hue. Additionally, the unique dipping sauce recipe adds an unmistakable touch to Vĩnh Long pancakes.

After the triple-filling Tet cake, citronella fruit is the next specialty of Vĩnh Long that I want to introduce to you. This is a fragrant fruit in Vĩnh Long, particularly in Dong Thanh commune (Binh Minh town, Vĩnh Long), where it is most commonly grown. When summer arrives, you'll be impressed by the vibrant yellow color shining brightly in the ripe citronella fruit orchards under the summer sun.

This tree resembles a mango tree, and its fruit bears some resemblance to lemons. The skin is green, turning orange-yellow when ripe, with a deliciously tangy-sweet taste that is incredibly enticing. In Vĩnh Long, there are two types of citronella fruit, one is sour and the other is sweet, suitable for different tastes of many people.

When you hear about field mice, many people might feel squeamish, but this is actually a specialty of Vĩnh Long. Field mice usually live in rice fields and can be found year-round in Vĩnh Long. Because they only eat rice, their meat is clean, firm, fatty, and very sweet. Local people often hunt field mice around the time when rice fields begin to be harvested because that's when mice are most abundant.

The mice are caught, skinned, cleaned, and washed with salt and ginger to remove any gaminess. Then they are drained, marinated with spices including salt, seasoning powder, chili, a little minced garlic, and lemongrass, for about 30 minutes. Finally, they are grilled over charcoal, turned regularly to ensure the meat is golden and when cooked, they emit a fragrant aroma. Grilled field mouse is a delicious, rustic, and unique dish in Vĩnh Long.

The next specialty is village chicken hotpot. This is a specialty that everyone wants to try when visiting Vĩnh Long. These chickens are free-range, feeding on insects, grains, and rice instead of commercial feed, so when cooked, the chicken meat is chewy, flavorful, and sweeter than usual.

When making the hotpot, peanuts are added to cook together, giving you the nutty, creamy flavor of peanuts. Fresh, green, clean vegetables are served as dipping accompaniments, cooked just right in the hotpot so they're not too tough nor too soft, allowing you to fully enjoy the flavors of the dish.

And the last specialty that I want to introduce to you is honey mandarin from Vĩnh Long. This is a specialty of Vĩnh Long that many tourists love. Honey mandarin is a type of citrus fruit, closely related to tangerines, and it's very easy to grow, especially in well-drained soil. When the trees are three years or older, they bear fruit.

This type of mandarin is larger than kumquats, sweeter than kumquats, and has yellow pulp. Honey mandarin helps boost the immune system, enhance physical strength, and is good for your skin. So, if you visit Vĩnh Long, you must try this fruit, and don't forget to buy some for your family as well! It will be a special gift for them!