Smelling jackfruit 

Jackfruit is the main fruit tree in the southern region. There’s an important step to find jackfruits which are ripe and meet standards for harvesting without having to cut them into segments. This is especially important as merchants have to carry jackfruits over long distance to the north, or to China. A new career, jackfruit 'smeller', has appeared.

Jackfruit has a special characteristic, which is unlike many other fruits. Merchants have to hire ‘experts’ to smell jackfruit to determine the age of jackfruit, which helps reduce the risk of buying young jackfruit or fruit with lots of black fiber. Jackfruit smellers are ‘famous’ as they have a lot of experience and can earn nearly VND1 million a day.

Folding clothes

Folding clothes and tidying wardrobes is a new profession in Vietnam. The service has been developing in other countries, including the US and Japan.

Grasping the trend and the domestic demand, more and more companies specializing in house cleaning, industrial cleaning and package home transfer are providing clothes folding service. The service fee is VND200,000-300,000 per hour.

Using shrimp paste to hunt for stone crabs

There are many cua da (Gecarcoidea lalandii) living in rivulets and streams in the central region in dry season. For local people, shrimp paste is the best bait to catch the delicious crabs.

When finding crabs hiding in deep holes, hunters use a small stick to dip shrimp paste in and leave it in front of the holes. They also drop a little shrimp paste into small puddles of water to lure crabs. Crabs are easily caught as they go out of the holes.

The fish dish that needs 5 liters of oil and take 10 hours to process

‘Ca nam vong’ or “fish lying on hammock’ is a famous dish of people in Diec hamlet of Hung Ha district in Thai Binh. The dish is mostly prepared at reaching-old-age parties, organized on the third day of lunar year.

The dish has such a special name because of its original processing recipe which use bamboo or iron bending tools with a hammock-like design.

The fish used to process the dish must be carp, which are selected to have the weight of 2.5 kilograms or more. They are cleaned in a way so as to keep fish scales intact and after that, people bend the fish along the ‘bamboo hammock’ and fry them until the fish is a brown color on both sides.

After processing, the fish still keeps their golden scales which represents the symbolic meaning of “turning into a dragon”.

The processing requires great patience. Processors need to use a large pan, and 5 liters of lard and vegetable oil. It takes about 8-10 years to prepare the dish.

Unripe mangosteen more expensive than ripe 

It may be a surprise to many people that unripe mangosteens, which are sour and acrid, are more expensive than ripe ones.

One kilogram of ripe mangosteen is sold at VND40,000-60,000 per kilogram, while the flesh of unripe mangosteen is priced at VND550,000-700,000. Those who are addicted to unripe mangosteen have to place orders in advance because the mangosteen is not available in the market.

“Unripe mangosteen is very rare because only gourmets order it. Other people throw unripe mangosteen away because they are very sour and acrid,” said Nguyen Thi Huyen in Cau Giay district in Hanoi.

Fish that fly like birds

In the waters of Da Nang, Quang Nam, and Quang Ngai, there is a fish that can fly like a bird, which is called flying fish (Exocoetidae). Flying fish has an elongated and slightly flattened body.  An adult flying fish has a length of 18-30.5 centimeters, weighs 0.5-6kg.

The most prominent feature on the body of flying fish is the fin. The fin is large and hard, which allows the fish to skim the water.

Salted eggplant 

For a long time, salted eggplant (Solanum macrocarpon) has been a familiar dish among Vietnamese. However, he salted eggplant in Khuong Ha hamlet of Thanh Xuan district in Hanoi is the most special. Though the products are expensive, VND200,000 per kilogram, it is still difficult to buy.

Khuong Ha eggplant is not like eggplant in other areas as people follow a very careful process to salt it. Eggplants become most delicious after one month of salting.

Unique bunch of flower from durian

A bunch of flowers, created with durian and flowers, is priced at VND750,000-2 million. As these are special bunches of flowers, they have attracted young people.

Hanh Nguyen