During the Cold Foods Festival, this year on April 14, Vietnamese families usually prepare traditional floating cakes, ‘banh troi’ (made of bits of brown sugar wrapped in glutinous rice paste and cooked by scalding in boiling water) and ‘banh chay’ (glutinous rice balls with mung beans filling, served in fragrant sweet soup) to offer to their ancestors.

Along with modern life, urban people are busier and many families no longer make banh troi and banh chay themselves. Instead, they buy the cakes directly from food stores, wet markets or even order online.

In Hanoi, on this day a traditional cake-making store on Ngo Thi Nham Street is always full of customers who come to buy banh troi and banh chay.

Customers are willing to line up and wait for half an hour to buy cakes from this famous store, which has been there for decades.

VietNamNet’s Pham Hai takes photos at the store during this year’s Cold Foods Festival.

Pham Hai

Floating cakes for Cold Foods Festival

The third day of the third lunar month is the Cold Foods Festival of Vietnamese people.