The offering tray for the Tết holiday is considered a distinctive cultural feature of the Vietnamese people. Depending on each region, the offering tray will have different delicious dishes, arranged very beautifully. Today, let’s take a look at 16 delicious dishes for the offering tray during Tết in the South with the Tips for Cooking section of TasteVN!
1 Tet Cake
When it comes to the Tet feast of the Northern people, there is often banh chung, while the Southern people’s feast always includes banh tet. This dish conveys many spiritual values and hopes of the Southern people for a prosperous and abundant new year.
Banh tet is traditionally eaten by Southern people during Tet with a salty filling of fatty pork. In addition, there are many other types of banh tet that are extremely delicious and attractive, such as pandan leaf banh tet, purple rice banh tet, and gac banh tet.
With the chewy and fragrant sticky rice, the creamy and rich mung bean combined with the strong flavor of the meat filling creates incredibly appealing cakes.
2 Braised Pork
Braised pork is a very characteristic dish during Tet for the Southern people. The dish has the sweet flavor of coconut water, blended with the rich taste of eggs and tender, delicious pieces of pork belly that are cooked just right.
The pork chosen for this dish is usually either pork leg or belly, fully consisting of skin, fat, and lean meat. According to the beliefs of the local people, these parts symbolize a new year full of happiness and abundance. Therefore, braised pork is always an indispensable dish on the Tet feast of the Southern people.
3 Stuffed Bitter Melon Soup
With the implication of hoping that all “hardships” have “passed,” and wishing for a new year to start with good luck and happiness, the Southern people’s Tet offerings cannot miss the stuffed bitter melon soup.
This dish is extremely familiar with the sweet flavor of minced meat, the crunchy texture of wood ear mushrooms, and the slight bitterness of bitter melon, all combined to create an incredibly refreshing and appealing soup.
4 Fresh Bamboo Shoot Soup
To make the Tet feast more complete, the delicious fresh bamboo shoot soup, simple yet packed with high nutritional value, is essential.
The soup has a clear broth with a sweet and fresh taste, along with tender meat and bones cooked just right, blending with the delicious and crunchy bamboo shoots, making anyone fall in love with it endlessly!
5 Sausage
Sausage is a popular dish among the people of the South, often made at home during the Tet holiday to eat or serve guests as a meaningful New Year gift.
There are many types of sausage in the South: dried sausage, fresh sausage, shrimp sausage, fish sausage,… which can easily be combined with other dishes on the Tet feast table to create a completely new dish while still retaining the characteristic flavor of sausage.
6 Pork sausage
On the Tet meal table of Southern people, pork sausage signifies warmth and comfort, with blessings filling the home. Therefore, during this occasion, everyone will prepare a plate of delicious and attractive pork sausage for their family’s feast.
This dish is made from fresh pork, seasoned to taste, and carries a light fragrance of pepper. When enjoying it, you will feel the chewy, rich flavor of the pork blended with a slight creamy taste, and dipping it in salt and pepper or fish sauce makes it incredibly delicious.
7 Pickled scallions
The Tet feast in the South certainly cannot be without the dish of pickled scallions, which has an irresistible delicious flavor. This is a familiar dish for every family and pairs extremely well with sticky rice cake.
You just need to prepare the scallions and soak them in a mixture of sweet and sour fish sauce. The crispy, delicious scallions have a slightly pungent, spicy flavor that blends wonderfully with the sweet and salty taste of the fish sauce.
8 Pickled mustard greens
Southern people often emphasize simplicity in their family’s Tet feast. They also pay a lot of attention to combining dishes so that they truly harmonize with each other.
Therefore, alongside greasy dishes, to effectively reduce heaviness, pickled mustard greens are indispensable. With extremely simple ingredients like mustard greens, salt, sugar,… combined with a few other spices. This dish has an eye-catching yellow color and a crispy, delicious taste. Eating it with square cake or sticky rice cake enhances the flavor perfectly.
9 Pickled Bean Sprouts
Another equally appealing side dish is pickled bean sprouts. In the South, not only during Tet but also in daily meals, this side dish is often present. With its unique sour-sweet taste and crunchy texture, it helps balance flavors while making the offering tray more diverse and visually appealing.
10 Pickled Radish
Pickled radish is also a very popular side dish to prevent boredom during Tet in the South. With a very simple recipe and ingredients, you can easily make this dish with fish sauce or soy sauce that is incredibly appetizing. This is also a side dish worth considering when choosing items to place on the Tet offering tray.
11 Boiled Chicken
Although this is a simple dish, it carries deep significance during Tet for the Southern people. For them, this dish symbolizes the fulfillment of wishes and abundant blessings.
To achieve the best quality, after cooking, the chicken should still have a golden skin, with the meat not being dry and retaining all its original nutrients.
12 Braised Offal
With easily found ingredients and simple preparation, braised offal is a must-try dish during the Tet feast in the South.
The distinctive delicious flavor from coconut milk, combined with the chewy and crispy textures of pork and beef offal, makes it extremely unique and appealing.
Additionally, braised offal can be creatively prepared with various ingredients such as pig’s ear offal, duck offal, chicken offal, and snail offal, allowing you to choose the delicious dish that best suits your family’s offering tray.
13 Chicken Salad
In Southern festive meals, the enticing mixed salad is a must-have. And TasteVN will reveal to you the super delicious chicken salad below!
Alongside the tender and delicious taste of chicken, there are also the distinctive flavors of accompanying ingredients such as onions, cabbage, lotus stem, water spinach,… No matter what ingredients are combined, the dish still offers a variety of flavors, helping you choose a delicious dish that suits your family’s taste.
14 Spring Rolls
In the New Year feast, a dish for snacking while chatting is indispensable, right? And spring rolls will be a worthy candidate to take on that role.
Each spring roll is visually appealing. You will feel the sweetness of shrimp combined with the rich flavor of the accompanying ingredients. Dipping them in sweet and sour fish sauce makes it even more delicious.
15 Fried Spring Rolls
Fried spring rolls symbolize the wish for a year of warmth and health, and they are an essential delicious dish in the New Year’s offerings of Southerners.
Each fried spring roll is crispy, filled with meat, shrimp, and various appealing vegetables. You can enjoy them with sweet and sour plum sauce to enhance the dish’s flavor.
16 Sticky Rice with Mung Beans
Sticky rice with mung beans is a delicious specialty of the South, while Northerners often call it “xôi xéo.” Because this dish is not only distinctive but also very familiar, it is often featured in festive meals.
With the glutinous rice grains blended with mung beans and carefully processed, it creates a sticky, soft dish, adding a unique touch to the New Year’s feast.
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Thus, TasteVN has helped you compile 16 delicious dishes for the Southern New Year altar. Hopefully, through this article, you will have more new suggestions to make your New Year’s feast more abundant and distinctive. Wishing you a joyful and happy new year!
