Buzz
If rat meat, balut, or blood pudding are delicacies cherished by many Vietnamese, they become nightmares for foreign visitors.
Balut
Balut can be prepared in various ways such as boiling or cooking with tamarind sauce and is one of the most common dishes in Vietnam. It appears in every nook and cranny from rural areas to cities. Just a street vendor with a few small stools can establish a familiar balut-selling spot every early morning or late afternoon.
Vietnamese people enjoy balut both for pleasure and for its believed nutritional value. However, for foreigners, even the bravest ones hesitate to try this unique dish.
Coconut Worms
Coconut Beetle Larvae
Coconut beetle larvae are a type of beetle larvae - insects that often choose healthy coconut tree trunks to bore into and lay eggs. When the eggs hatch, the larvae grow by feeding on the young shoots of the coconut tree.
People in the Mekong Delta region often catch these larvae to make delicious and famous delicacies. Normally, 1 kg of coconut beetle larvae can cost up to 500,000 Vietnamese dong, and during off-season periods, the price can be even higher.
Balut
Red Duck Blood Jelly is a favorite dish of many Vietnamese people. Balut is made from the blood of various animals such as pigs, goats, and ducks. After these animals are slaughtered and their blood collected, it is mixed with a little fish sauce or saltwater, lime, then mixed with finely chopped cartilage and meat, sprinkled with aromatic herbs and peanuts. After a while, the blood congeals and is ready to eat.
Street vendors often sell this dish. Many people have ended up in the hospital due to poisoning, but subjective psychology still makes people regularly eat balut.
Rodent Delicacy
Despite being ugly and frightening creatures, rats are delicacies in the menu of many Vietnamese restaurants, and not every place serves this dish. Usually, in rural areas during the harvest season, plump rats hiding in the fields can be hunted. Rat meat is white and tastes as good as chicken.
After cleaning and marinating, rat meat can be processed into many delicious dishes such as thinly sliced rats cooked with coconut milk, fried rats sprinkled with lime leaves, or grilled stuffed rats.
Medicinal Wine
Medicinal wine is a traditional type of liquor in Vietnam. Producers can make medicinal wine by soaking alcohol with various herbs or live animals such as insects, snakes, scorpions, or lizards.
Men are very fond of this type of wine because it boosts vitality. However, looking at a bottle of wine containing the whole bodies of these gruesome animals can make many people shudder, especially Western tourists visiting Vietnam.
As per Ngoisao.net
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Reference: Travel guide Mytour
MytourDecember 4, 2015
