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Phu The Cakes - The wedding cakes

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According to legend, the villagers of Dinh Bang have been making Phu The (wedding) cakes since the 11th century. Le Khac Xuan explains this labor of love.

Mrs. Lue carefully cleans strips of banana leaves, which shine like silver in the first light of dawn. After she has finished washing the sweet-smelling leaves, other tastes await her. She must cut strips of bamboo twine, wash the rice, clean the soybeans, mill the flour and finally, make the cakes. When the cakes are cool, she will use the bamboo strips to tie them into pairs.

Mrs. Lue checks each cake to ensure that there are no flaws, and then arranges the pairs in a basket that she covers with a white cloth. She works with great care, determined to maintain the good name of her family's traditional products. After all, her phu the cakes are no ordinary sweets, but symbols of the wedded bliss.

Like most residents of Dinh Bang commune, some 15km from Hanoi in Vietnam's northern province of Bac Ninh, Mrs. Lue grows a small patch of cai hoa vang, the sticky rice used to make phu the cakes. When they're not farming ordinary, non-glutinous rice, some 400 residents of Dinh Bang earn extra money by making phu the cakes. According to village elders, the Lue, Dao Hoa and Loi Quyen families have been making these cakes for four generations. Legend has it that Dinh Dang's cooks were known for their cakes as far back as the Ly Dynasty (1010-1225 A.D.).

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