Rustic cassava and betel leaf soup

Over 40 years old, I was moved to tears when I tasted the sweet flavor of my childhood in a pot of cassava soup with betel leaves.

Traditional cassava and betel leaf soup. Photo: Hong Sanh

The aroma of de-compressed peanut oil mixed with the scent of piper lolot leaves in the chilly air of Tra My mountain region is extremely appealing to the taste buds. I carefully tasted each spoonful of soup with the hope of finding the old taste again. The sweet taste of cassava mixed with the sweet taste of piper lolot leaves brought me back to my peaceful childhood in the poor countryside.

There, after school every afternoon, I ran to the fence to pick young green betel leaves for my mother to cook cassava soup. There, after returning from the field, my father went to the garden to pull out an old cassava root laden with tubers. There, I sat there watching my mother peel each cassava skin and kindly asked me about my studies that day.

When I grew up a little, I peeled the cassava myself, meticulously leaving the skin intact and showing it to my mother with a sparkling smile in my eyes. There, I often quietly watched my mother peel each shallot that my grandmother sent from the sea. Then, she added a little peanut oil to sauté, put the cut cassava in to stew, poured boiling water over it and cooked until the cassava was soft. When the cassava was soft, she would add the betel leaves and take it off the stove.

The aroma of the rustic soup, filled with my mother's love, lingered throughout the small kitchen. In the chilly air of the highlands, my parents and siblings gathered around the simple meal, happily sniffing the hot bowl of cassava soup and eating it deliciously.

No meat, no shrimp, no spices, cassava soup with betel leaves is a dish that you will remember forever after trying it once. The delicious, sweet flavor of mountain cassava is enough to evoke everyone's senses.

We grew up in a time of famine and hardship. But for me, every moment in the past is a sweet and beautiful memory. It was the rustic dishes that my parents cooked that raised my siblings and I...

Source: https://baoquangnam.vn/dan-da-canh-khoai-san-la-lot-3149768.html