Taste Atlas has just introduced delicious, but little known dishes to the world so that diners have more choices when coming to Vietnam.

Not as luxurious and sophisticated as European cuisines, but Vietnamese cuisine is simple but always knows how to please diners. Even the dessert, which is in addition to the well-known main courses, can leave guests impressed thanks to its irresistible flavor.

“Che” has a characteristic that is simple but extremely delicate. The natural aroma in chè is the original aroma of the ingredients. The cooking stage is also meticulous, nuts such as nuggets and beans are carefully dropped into the pot so that they do not sink to the bottom.

Any traditional sweet soup, drink, pudding, or other custard-like dessert made with a base of either water or coconut cream and served either hot or cold is considered a Vietnamese chè dish. Other ingredients for making chè include various jellies and fruits, beans and pulses, rice and grains, and even tubers and cereals.

Pomelo Sweet Soup (Chè bưởi)

(Pomelo Sweet Soup)

 “Chè bưởi is a traditional Vietnamese pomelo soup. It's made with a combination of pomelo, mung beans, and coconut. The green pomelo cover is peeled off, and the white spongy parts are used for the dish. They're cut into cubes, salted, soaked in water, rinsed, boiled, and mixed with sugar and tapioca starch.
The mixture is combined with steamed mung beans, water, coconut milk, and sugar until the combination develops a thick consistency. This dessert is especially popular during the summer due to its cooling properties.”

Chè bưởi is not only a food, but also a part of Vietnamese heritage, culture, and spirituality. Chè bưởi frequently conjures up childhood memories of a calm and serene sky, as well as the revered maternal and paternal affections of grandmothers and mothers.

Sticky Rice Balls in Ginger Syrup (Chè trôi nước)

(Sticky Rice Balls in Ginger Syrup, Chè xôi nước)

“Chè trôi nước is a Vietnamese dessert that combines sweet ginger-flavored soup and rice balls. The soup is usually sweetened with palm sugar, and it's sometimes additionally flavored with pandan leaves, while the filling inside the glutinous rice balls traditionally includes a combination of coconut milk and mung bean paste.

Although it is considered a traditional Vietnamese specialty, it is believed that the dish was modeled on tangyuan—a similar sweet soup of Chinese origin. Chè trôi nước is always served warm, typically garnished with coconut milk and roasted sesame seeds.
It is commonly enjoyed as a comforting wintertime dessert.”

Chè trôi nước made from glutinous rice flour, a fragrant green bean filling, a sweet and sweet sugar water along with the fatty taste of coconut milk, it creates a unique and delicious taste for this tea. This tea has long been included in literature and poetry, so no one is unaware of its popularity.

Due to their filling ingredients of beans and sticky rice, they are a common snack item sold in plastic cups at Vietnamese grocery stores. The so-called chè u trng is one of the most popular chè varieties made at home.

This coconut syrup-flavored white bean and rice pudding is traditionally served during Vietnamese family gatherings honoring a baby's first birthday.

(Lotus Seeds and Green Rice Flakes Sweet Soup)

“Chè hạt sen is a traditional Vietnamese sweet soup hailing from Hue. This local specialty contains buttery lotus seeds and green rice flakes in a sweet broth. Due to the cooling properties of this dish, locals often consume it in the summer in order to combat the heat.
In the past, this sweet soup was served to royal families. Nowadays, the residents of Hue serve it to important guests on special occasions.”

Chè hạt sen is one of the old Vietnamese tea dishes used to advance the king, not only because of its sweetness, but also because of its high nutritional value, improving the state of body weakness.

s and Gre Vietnamese Mung Bean Sweet Soup (Chè đậu xanh)

(Vietnamese Mung Bean Sweet Soup)

“Chè đậu xanh is a traditional Vietnamese dessert soup. It's prepared with mung beans as the main ingredient. Apart from the mung beans, the soup also contains water, sugar, and coconut milk. The beans are soaked, drained, rinsed, then slowly simmered with sugar until tender.

Coconut milk is added near the end of cooking, and the soup is then left to cool down or chilled in the refrigerator. Due to the fact that mung beans have cooling properties, chè đậu xanh is especially popular in the summer.”

For hot summer days in Saigon, Chè Đậu Xanh is a must. Like many other types of Chè, the dish consists of simple ingredients like simmered mung beans, glutinous soup, and coconut milk. With the beans’ soft, creamy texture, the jelly-like soup’s refreshing sweetness, and the coconut milk’s rich flavors, Chè Đậu Xanh never fails to put a smile on tourists who are looking for shelter from the scorching sun.

Vietnamese Taro Pudding (Chè khoai môn)

(Vietnamese Taro Pudding)

"Chè khoai môn is a traditional Vietnamese taro pudding. This simple dessert is prepared with cubes of taro, sticky rice, pandan extract, and sugar. The cubes of taro are steamed until soft, then combined with cooked sticky rice, a few drops of pandan, and sugar.
This pudding is served hot or chilled, and it's recommended to top it with coconut sauce before serving."

If creamy mung beans and silky tofu aren’t exactly your cup of tea, how about some chewy cendol? Cendol Sweet Soup, so named because of its primary component, is widely available in South East Asian nations. Arriving to Vietnam, the meal took on a version where adzuki beans (red), white black-eyed peas (white), and cendol (green) can be found. The ingredients not only give the dish its iconic name Chè Ba Màu, but are also combined perfectly to suit the preference of any picky eater.

Three Color Dessert (Chè ba màu)

(Three Color Dessert, Rainbow Dessert, Rainbow Drink)

“Chè ba màu is a colorful Vietnamese dish that belongs to the category of desserts, drinks, puddings, porridges, and soups regarding its consistency. It might include sticky rice, tapioca pearls, lotus seeds, sweet beans, water chestnuts, or agar jelly.

Regardless of the wide variety of ingredients used in chè, they are almost always drenched in coconut milk and additionally garnished with bananas, crushed peanuts, or other toppings. The dish is served either hot or cold, although it is especially popular as a chilly treat on hot summer days.

It is believed that the Cantonese dessert soup called tong sui is chè ba màu's predecessor. The dish is sometimes referred to as three-layered dessert or rainbow dessert due to its three distinct layers: yellow (mung beans), red (azuki beans), and green (agar jelly with pandan extract).

There are also some other varieties of chè such as chè bap, chè ba ba, and chè dau den, but chè ba màu still holds the number one spot in terms of popularity.”

Cendol Sweet Soup, so named because of its primary component, is widely available in South East Asian nations. Arriving to Vietnam, the meal took on a version where adzuki beans (red), white black-eyed peas (white), and cendol (green) can be found.