Duc Buu village (Huong So, Hue city) is an old village with nearly 20 households making the banh loc. Mrs. Ha Thi Thao's household on Nguyen Van Linh street is one of them, having peddled specialities of banh beo, banh nam, banh loc and ram it in the 1990s.

From peddling the banh loc on the streets, Mrs. Thao now has to hire eight more employees so as to meet the market demand.

What makes Mrs. Thao's banh loc distinctive is its soft chewy tapioca paste, and on top of that, the filling is fatty and crispy. Mrs. Thao’s banh loc is not sticky in hands when diners peeled the banana leaf wrapper.

Over the recent 2-3 years, diners across the country have come to know Mrs. Thao’s delicacies. Hence, every day on average she has to knead a quintal of tapioca starch, equivalent to 6,000 banh loc dumplings to meet the demand.

Currently a company in Hue is establishing connections to put the products into its food system to serve customers.

Mrs. Thao shares that other stores often cook the tapioca paste rather well (up to 80%) before wrapping the dumplings, but she uses her own way of cooking the paste, so that it is only about 20% cooked. This makes the paste soft and chewy.

"In order to make the easy-to-peel banh loc, you must clean both sides of each piece of banana leaf, one by one, instead of cleaning the whole leaf," she reveals.

To make the shrimp filling aromatic and tasty…

…, purple onions and pepper should be added when the shrimps are nearly cooked

Fatty pork or pork belly for the filling should be fried a little to make it fatty, crispy and aromatic.

The appetizing and mouthwatering look of banh loc

The dumplings are vacuum-packed to be transported and stored easily. They are preserved by freezing. To ensure the dumplings’ quality, you should eat them within ten days from purchase. If it is longer than this period, their quality is only about 80%.

Besides the banh loc, other delicacies such as beo and ram it are also highly appreciated by diners

The diners don’t mind waiting to enjoy Mrs. Thao's delicacies

By Han Dang 

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