Unlike mentioned cakes, Khoai cake contains many ingredients and goes through totally different processing procedures. The main material for the cover is rice flour to be mixed with water and yolk and flavored with cumin. The mixed flour layer is fried until crispy around the edges, then is filled with pepper, green onion, shelled shrimp, sliced broiled beef or pounded pork belly, fresh bean sprouts, field mushroom. Next, it is folded in half to make it “smile”.
After broken off the cake by chopsticks and wrapped in fresh mustard greens with aromatic herbs, sliced green banana and fig, the cake is dipped in a special sauce (called “tuong”) that is rather condensed, salty, moderately sweet, made from fined grind rice flour, thick soya sauce, fried sesame, chopped pig liver, garlic and chili. Adding a little shrimp paste to the sauce is certain to make it more moreish. All flavors seem to converge into that small piece of cake, harmonizing with each other so perfectly that just a try can worth a thousand words.
All the cakes could be found in other regions of Vietnam but nowhere can you savor the harmony of ingredients, the rustic simplicity of decorations and tranquil ambience that only belong to Hue and its hospitable citizens.
