Every city or province in Viet Nam has at least one area that is famous for making bánh chưng (sticky-rice cakes), the typical and indispensable Tet food. The best Huế sticky-rice cakes come from Nhật Lệ Street in the Imperial Citadel. They're a tasty combination of rice, green beans, lean pork, lard, and spices such as salt, pepper, and spring onions. According to Mrs. Thêm, whose family has been making sticky-rice cakes for three generations, a quality cake requires selecting pork fresh from the butcher and the best sticky rice with even grains. The cook should boil the sticky-rice cakes for exactly the right amount of time so that the sticky rice inside is well done yet not pasty. Cool cakes are more delicious than hot cakes.
While many other shops sell banh chu'ng only at Telt, Nhật Lệ sells bánh chưng year round. Every household on the street has a workshop to make sticky-rice cakes.
Mrs. Thêm, at No. 97, produces cakes in the back yard and displays and sells stacks of cakes at her front door. She has about a dozen workers. Some clean dong (arrowroot) leaves to wrap the cakes, while others wash the sticky rice, chop meat, pack the cakes, and stoke the fire. Mrs. Thêm, who is 60, has been making sticky-rice cakes since she was a child. Every day she supervises her children and grandchildren to be sure they produce the best quality banh chung Nhât Lê.
People from Nhât Lệ make sticky-rice cakes of different sizes and kinds, including vegetarian cakes. The smaller cakes are more difficult to wrap. The smallest cakes, which are the size of a match box, use fifty grams of sticky rice and cost 2,000 VND ($ 0,13) for two. The next larger cakes are twice the size and price. The largest cakes costs from 30,000 to 50,000 VND ($1.90 to $3.18) a pair. Shops make these largest cakes only on special order for weddings, death-day anniversaries, and for Tet.