Chè: Traditional Vietnamese Dessert

 Chè (pronounced closely as J-eh) or traditional Vietnamese dessert is very distinct from the common Western desserts. It is in the consistency of commonly soups or beverages and occasionally puddings and stick rice. Various fruits, nuts, beans, rice, cereals, eggs, and jellies are combined to create different chè or desserts. It can be consumed warm or cold and is generally sweet in taste, but it can also be savoury in flavour depending on the ingredients used.

This week I dropped by a Vietnamese store selling chè and purchased  two types of desserts as shown below. Chè bột khoai or sweet potato soup dessert (upper right) and xôi sầu riêng or durian sweet sticky rice dessert (bottom right).

 Sweet potato soup dessert (above) is a personal favourite, it consists of a mixture of ingredients that gives texture whilst eating. So what exactly are these ingredients? Well it consists of:

• sweet potatoes
• peanuts
• lotus seeds
• coconut milk
• various jellies (lychee flavoured)
• yellow beans
• seaweed

Yes, there is seaweed in this and you're probably thinking "that's gross". Actually when consuming it, it doesn't taste like seaweed at all, neither smell like it either. It's quite favourless, and instead gives more of a jelly-like texture when consumed with the cononut milk, making it sweet and enjoyable to eat.

Soup Chè or soup desserts are not only sold in stores or on the streets to be eaten at anytime, it is likewise with Western culture sometimes traditionally served after the last meal; dinner. Some Asian restaurants do this serving particularly hot or warm chè with complimentary fruits.

Sweet sticky rice dessert in the flavour of durian is another personal favourite, and yes I LOVE DURIAN. Durian can be a love or hate fruit, loving it for its taste and smell and hating it for it's smell and prickly handling according to what I've encountered. But in this type of dessert the durian smell is absent, but the taste is. The sticky rice is steamed with the following ingredients:

• durian
• pandan 

You're probably wondering if this is durian flavoured, then shouldn't this be yellow? Well actually what gives the sticky rice a green colour is the pandan itself. 

So when can you eat this, well you can consume this anytime in the day or night, but it isn't served as dessert after a meal, instead it is more of a snack in the form of a dessert.

Hope you enjoy this post, don't be scared of trying something new. It might become a favourite if you try it :)

Blog Post by: Elizabeth Tran.

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1st image taken from the following links:

http://www.vatgia.com/pictures_fullsize/wkn1187083780.jpg

http://nuoccotdua.com.vn/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/che-thap-cam1.jpg

http://10s.vn/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/che-my-mang-phong-cach-phuong-tay.jpg