Cold Food Festival is a traditional culture of Vietnamese which happens annually at 3/3 lunar year. It’s the day the whole family gathers together to make “Bánh trôi”, “Bánh chay” which are created by very simple ingredients like: glutinous rice flour, green beans, and sugar.
The Festival has an origin from Chinese culture. However, Cold Food Festival of Vietnam is very different versus China’s in the process of cross-culture. In China, all foods were cooked by previous day and fire is banned during the whole day, while, Vietnamese family is cooking “Bánh trôi”, “Bánh chay” in the day.
The meaning of the festival in Vietnam is to reveal our thankfulness to our ancestors. We display trays of fruit, water and 3 or 5 “Bánh trôi” and “Bánh chay” dishes on our ancestral altar. It’s always to be the day which the kids are extreme eager