Sour fish sauce - The memorable taste of a river region

“Cây bần soi bóng ghe nghèo

Qua sông gặp gió em chèo cùng anh”

For children in river areas, no one is unfamiliar with the Sonneratia caseolaris tree, the tall tree on the banks of a peaceful river has long become a beautiful image, very familiar but also extremely close. When an exile returned to their homeland, from afar he saw the familiar silhouette of a cork tree lying sideways on the riverbank, swaying its branches and leaves as if it wanted to open its arms to welcome the returnee. As the light boat floated on the river, beloved images of our homeland appeared one after another right before our eyes. There are tall cork roots, no one knows what year or month they grow, they only know that when people notice, they have turned into ancient trees with large rough roots standing tall and reaching out branches four or five meters high. The shadow of the poor homeland is like the image of a father but has the gentleness of a mother, a place of refuge for countless lives. Under the shade of cork trees, merchant ships rest after tiring wanderings. High cork branches are where birds choose to nest. Every time the afternoon falls gently on the river, flocks of birds also find their cozy nest under the familiar cork tree, chirping and chirping with peaceful sounds. It can be said that the cork tree has become a part of the lives of people in the river region of the Southwest. Cork trees create peace in the countryside, cork trees provide shade, cork fruits and flowers contribute to the delicious flavor of dishes. The cork roots towards straight into the sky and is very good when used to make vegetarian jam.

There are two varieties of cork:  Plate cork and Guava cork. The guava tree is rarer and usually grows in home gardens. The fruit is round, small and dark green. The fruit often grows in rivers, has large and slightly flat fruits. When raw, cork fruit is acrid, when it is almost ripe, it is bitterly sour, and when ripe, it is tenderly sour and has a very attractive aroma. People in the West often pick ripe cork fruit to cook sour soup with many local products such as Linh fish, pike perch, water hyacinth, etc. From there, they create a sour soup with a very unique and intoxicating taste, especially for people from river regions, when picking a bunch of cork roots, they will definitely crave the dish of raw fish sauce sandwiched with sour crab, imbued with the rustic flavor of their homeland. Wash the cork then cut it into thin slices. Eating raw fish sauce together can be fish sauce, fish sauce, fish sauce, Linh fish sauce,... all are very suitable. The fish sauce is mixed with lemon, sugar, garlic and chili to make it fragrant and flavorful, then served with sliced ​​cork. For people far from home, every time they come home, they don't need anything luxurious, just seeing a plate of raw fish sauce with poor people makes them naturally crave it and can't stand it! Pick up a piece of cork and clamp it into a piece of fish sauce, then put it in your mouth and chew slowly to feel the taste of your hometown deeply and for a long time. The sour and acrid piece of fish sauce, the salty fish sauce that tastes like the river, oh how the love for the countryside, the love for the land, and the love for people is so overwhelming!

The West has many diverse salads, from flavors to how to combine ingredients, you can't tell it out of those salads for all day long. There are salads made from fruits, vegetables, and flowers that are very simple, such as banana salad, so astringent that people still love it; Sesbania salad with a little bitter, anyone who eats it will enjoy it; Or poinciana flower salad, both beautiful and delicious; and the white cork flower salad, especially filled with a feeling of love for the homeland of the Southern land with low water and high waters... The white cork flower, a country dish served in the heart of the homeland, is so delicious that it makes everyone sob heart!

Anyone who has ever seen a cork flower must admit that the wildflower grows from a wild tree but has a heart-stopping beauty. When the cork flower is new, it only has a small, round bud, with a green color mixed with the green of the leaves. When the flower bud just opens, small pink flower petals will appear, nestled tightly together. Then one day, when the flower petals have absorbed enough dew and sunshine from heaven and earth, it will bloom into bunches of white, pink, and white flowers that will lie quivering in the sunlight and then swing along the branches and leaves, waiting for the wind to blow through the silk cotton yarn small flowers slowly drift with the wind to immerse themselves in the cool river water of their hometown. Those who have traveled far away know how deeply it feels to miss their hometown, to remember the river where we used to bathe in cool water, to remember the old cork tree that has passed through so many lifetimes, to remember the small boat we used to swim along the riverbank in the past picking cork flowers and cork fruits to bring home for my mother to cook delicious dishes... The children of the past have now grown up, returning to their homeland and can still swim skillfully as if they had never been away, the old cork tree is still blooming on time, waiting for people to return. The small, beautiful flower buds radiate a gentle fragrance and hang down to lie swaying under the water for people's hands to freely pick...