Hand-cooked coconut candy
Coconut candy village
In coconut country, the smell of coconut cream cooking in pans fills the hamlet from early morning. Every candy passes through a dozen hands.
Heritage: Several decadesVinh Long
Dried coconut is grated and pressed for cream, then cooked with malt and sugar in big pans. Workers stir constantly so it doesn't burn, pouring it into moulds only when thick and chewy.
Cooled candy is cut, wrapped in thin edible rice paper, then in paper. Today there are pandan, durian, peanut and cocoa flavours too.
Good candy needs a gentle fire and a hand that never stops stirring.
How it's made
- 1Grate and press coconut
- 2Cook with malt
- 3Pour and cut
- 4Wrap in rice paper and paper
Traditional craft villages
- Red brick and pottery from domed kilnsMang Thit pottery villageAlong Thay Cai canal, red domed kilns stand in a row like a small kingdom – where river clay becomes bricks, jars and pots.
- Coconut rice paperMy Long rice paper villageWood fires are lit by 3 am. By noon, white drying racks line the village lanes.
- Ornamental flowers on raised bedsSa Dec flower villageIn Sa Dec, flowers grow not on the ground but on beds raised over water channels – so they stay dry when the floods come.
- Thousand-layer pia cakeVung Thom pia cake villageThe smell of butter and durian fills the road – you have reached pia cake village.