Vietnamese cuisine

Vietnamese food and drink come from a long tradition rooted in the country itself. A typical meal balances five fundamental tastes: sweet, salty, bitter, sour, and spicy. Each dish is also designed to reflect one or more elements—like nutrients or colors—following a five-part philosophy.

Regional cuisines

Common ingredients include lemongrass, ginger, mint, Vietnamese mint, brown sugar, long coriander, Saigon cinnamon, bird's eye chili, soy sauce, lime, and Thai basil leaves. Traditional cooking is known for using fresh ingredients, little dairy or oil, interesting textures, and plenty of herbs and vegetables. The cuisine is low in sugar and almost always naturally gluten-free, since many dishes rely on rice—such as rice noodles, rice paper wrappers, and rice flour—rather than wheat.

Historical influences

Historical influences shape the cuisine too. Centuries of contact with China brought dishes like wonton, char siu, har gow, shahe fen, wheat noodles, popiah, youtiao, mooncake, Suzhou-style mooncake, nian gao, tang yuan, bánh bò, baozi, Yangzhou fried rice, and chow mein.

The Vietnamese adapted these, adding their own flavors. Ethnic minorities near the China–Vietnam border, such as the Tày and Nùng in Lạng Sơn, adopted roasted pork and braised pork belly from China. New World vegetables like chili peppers and corn also arrived via the Ming dynasty.

The French introduced baguettes, which were combined with Vietnamese fillings to create the popular fast food known abroad as Vietnamese baguettes—bánh mì thịt, where bánh mì means bread and thịt means meat or stuffing. The French also brought onions, potatoes, broccoli, tomatoes, cauliflower, lettuce, tarragon, carrots, artichokes, asparagus, and coffee.

Many of these ingredients got names by adding the word tây (western) to a similar native term: onions became hành tây (western shallots), asparagus became măng tây (western bamboo shoots), and potatoes became khoai tây (western yam). French-influenced dishes include salad, pâté, pâté chaud, croissant, flan, yogurt, rotisserie, butter, duck à l'orange, omelette, œufs au plat, farcies, beefsteak, cooking with wine, jambon, and saucisse. French colonial rule also spread shared dishes and beverages—like baguettes and coffee—across Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia, and introduced dairy products into Vietnamese-French fusion cooking.

Influences from Champa, Malaysia, and Cambodia are present as well. Coconut milk and central dishes like bánh khọt came from Cham cuisine. Malay and Indian traders introduced spices and curries. While curry is uncommon in the north, it is popular in central and southern Vietnam, especially chicken curry and, less often, goat curry.

Chicken curry is essential at weddings, funerals, graduations, and death anniversaries. As in Cambodia, curry is eaten with bread, steamed rice, or round rice noodles. Prahok (mắm bồ hóc), adopted from ethnic Khmer in southern Vietnam, is a key ingredient in bún nước lèo, a rice noodle soup that originated with ethnic Khmers in Vietnam and is not found in Cambodia.

Contact with former communist countries in Eastern Europe brought dishes like stuffed cabbage soup, Olivier salad (sa lát Nga), and Czech beer (bia Tiệp).

Regional cuisines share several core features. Meats are usually cooked only briefly. Vegetables are eaten fresh or lightly boiled or stir-fried.

Herbs and vegetables are essential and used abundantly. Textures vary and harmonize—crisp with soft, watery with crunchy, delicate with rough. Broths and soup-based dishes are common everywhere.

Meals are presented with colorful, eye-pleasing condiments. Despite these shared traits, each region has its own character. In northern Vietnam, a colder climate limits spice availability, so the food there is generally less spicy than in other regions.