Selling a cake with a strange name, the silver-haired old lady makes diners crazy, wanting to eat it, they have to order in advance or wait patiently.
Mrs. Le's "alley hidden" banh khot shop. Video: Ha Nguyen
Sell cakes to relieve sadness
After the noon market, Mrs. Hai (69 years old) and her friend named Muoi (62 years old) stopped by alley 565 Nguyen Trai street (Ward 7, District 5, HCMC) to wait to buy hot banh khot.
The two sat in front of a small bakery with a red-hot charcoal stove. The owner, Mrs. Le Thi Le (80 years old), with gray hair, sat in front of the charcoal stove, her back to the door. She quickly stirred the pot of flour, then scooped and poured it into round molds in a pan of boiling oil.
After a few minutes, the aroma of fried cakes wafted up. Mrs. Le added fried shrimp on top of the cake, then took it out onto a plate for the guests to enjoy.
The rich, fatty, crispy taste of the cake makes Mrs. Hai and Mrs. Muoi always praise this as one of the best banh khot shops they have ever eaten. That is why few people believe that Mrs. Le has only started selling this cake since the Covid-19 pandemic.
Before that, Mrs. Le only stayed at home to look after her younger sister's children. Later, her grandchildren all went to study abroad. Having no children and being alone at home, she felt lonely so she went to live with her aunt.
When her aunt became old and weak and passed away, she returned home to live alone. Feeling bored with nothing to do, she thought of making cakes to sell for fun.
She remembered a strange-sounding cake called banh khot that she had eaten. After that, she figured out how to make this cake herself.
She said: “I mix the flour and make the cake according to my own taste, without learning anyone’s recipe or being taught by anyone. I use pancake flour to make the cake.
I added coconut milk powder, eggs, peeled mung beans and seasoned to taste. My cake had no meat, only fried shrimp.
Every day, I only make a small pot of flour and sell it for 2 hours. Once the pot of flour is sold out, I stop making and selling any more.
I can make about 200 cakes from this pot of flour, earning about 1 million VND. But I only make a profit of about 100,000 VND.”
Want to eat must wait patiently
Even though she only makes cakes for fun, Ms. Le always chooses the best ingredients. She uses flour from delicious rice, green beans with large, even, golden grains that are not broken, crumbly, or peeled.
Every morning, she goes to the market to buy fresh shrimp, green vegetables, and herbs, then picks them herself, washes them, and stores them in the refrigerator. She cleans the fresh shrimp, roasts them for about half an hour before frying the cakes.
Mrs. Le fried the cakes with the same bottled cooking oil that she usually used for cooking at home. In particular, she has a secret recipe for mixing fish sauce with just the right amount of sweet and sour that everyone praises as delicious.
She fried the cakes using a charcoal stove and always kept the temperature moderate. She shared: “Many people saw that I took a long time to fry the cakes, making customers stand and sit waiting, so they advised me to switch to a gas stove because the heat was strong and the cakes cooked quickly.
However, the cake fried on a charcoal stove is more delicious. When frying, you have to do it slowly and keep the heat at a moderate level. If it is too hot, the cake will burn on the outside but not be cooked on the inside. Therefore, the cake will not be cooked evenly and crispy.
After about 30 minutes, Mrs. Le finished frying 50 banh khot for Mrs. Hai. At this time, many other diners were also waiting to enjoy her cakes.
Customers come to the restaurant from all walks of life and ages. Because Mrs. Le is the only one who both fries and serves the cakes, customers set up their own tables and chairs and wait their turn.
Mrs. Hai shared: “I am a regular customer of Mrs. Le so I know that she sells cakes mainly to have someone to chat with for fun and to exercise, not to focus on income.
However, her cakes are delicious and in high demand. Because she sells few cakes, customers who want to eat them have to come early, wait, order in advance, or stand in line to wait.
A male student named Tuan Anh learned about Ms. Le's bakery after watching a video on social media. Out of curiosity, Tuan Anh came to try it out and became a regular customer of the shop.
Every week, the male student visits Mrs. Le’s shop to enjoy his favorite cake. Tuan Anh shared: “The cakes here are delicious, the accompanying vegetables are fresh, clean, plentiful and only cost 5,000 VND/cake.
This is a fairly cheap price compared to the general level in Ho Chi Minh City. Therefore, I have become a regular customer of Aunt Le for over a year now."
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Source: https://vietnamnet.vn/cu-ba-toc-bac-o-tphcm-ban-banh-ten-la-khach-muon-an-phai-den-som-ngoi-cho-2377510.html
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