BAC HA FOREST BAMBOO SHOOTS

Impress by the taste of bitter but Bac Ha forest bamboo shoots is always loved by many tourists.

After raining, forest bamboo shoots raise up and grown really fast. Without the sweetness like plain’s bamboo shoots, Bac Ha bamboo shoots is bitter. It can be thought that the bitterness can be disliked, but surprisingly it is the reason to make everybody love this shoot.

Bac Ha people said that the best time to have good bamboo shoots is right after the rain. Looking for bamboo shoots is not difficult because they are everywhere in the forest. They just carry a knife and head to the forest, when see any shoot they just use the knife to chop it off, then put in their “gui” (a handcraft back bag made by bamboo).

The shoots then is washed and cleaned well. The big shoots is sliced into smaller pieces to bake with bone. The smaller one is used to make pickle shoot. Many people like the taste of bitter of this shoot, so they slice it, boil and eat with chili salt or shrimp paste. The bitterness in the shoot is decreased after boiling, when you eat it will slowly turn into the sweetness.

Many people think that in bamboo shoots have a bit of poison, so it should be boiled without a lid to release all the poison.

In bamboo shoot season, there are so many shoots that Bac Ha people have to dry them to store for later use. The shoots are born naturally, carry the flavor of high land then become a familiar dish of high land people. In any chance coming to Bac Ha, the tourists always bring back some shoots as gift for people at home. 


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