Che Hue — Dozens of Sweet Soups in a Single Shop
A Hue che shop lays out several dozen jars. One of them sounds improbable: tapioca dumplings wrapped around roast pork — sweet and savoury at once.
This page is translated from Vietnamese. Prices and opening hours are checked against Vietnamese sources — see the Vietnamese version for the most recent update.
Photo: Phương Huy · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikimedia Commons (cropped to 16:9 and resized)
Chè — sweet soup — is more closely tied to Hue than to any other city in central Vietnam. A Hue chè shop typically has several dozen jars out at once, one variety in each.
Why Hue has so many kinds
Hue was the imperial capital, and the palace kitchens demanded sweets that were both good and good-looking enough to present to the court. Many kinds of chè were created there and then spread into ordinary use.
Alongside that ran the popular version, sold by street vendors and small shops. The two traditions blended, leaving behind a list longer than almost anywhere else has.
Some worth ordering
- Lotus seed and longan — Tịnh Tâm lotus seeds boiled soft and nested inside a longan. The most-cited of the imperial sweets.
- Tapioca dumpling with roast pork — a clear tapioca ball wrapped around a piece of roast pork, in ginger syrup. It sounds improbable, but the salty richness inside is exactly what makes it memorable.
- Lima bean chè — soft beans in a clear, clean syrup.
- Corn chè from Cồn Hến — made with young corn grown on the islet in the Perfume River.
- Purple yam, whipped mung bean, mixed chè — the familiar, easy group.
Mildly sweet, never cloying
What Hue chè has in common is that it is lightly sweet rather than the sharp sweetness of the southern versions, and that it comes in small bowls.
The small bowl is not a way of selling more: it is so you can order several kinds at one sitting. Ordering three or four different bowls at a Hue chè shop is entirely normal.
Where to eat it
Chè in Hue belongs to small shops and street carts, busiest from the afternoon into the evening.
- The Hùng Vương area and the streets around the market have several long-established shops.
- Cồn Hến is where to find corn chè at its source, worth combining with a bowl of cơm hến.
Each bowl costs very little, so order a few and find the one that suits you.
Can you take it home
Chè is best on the day it is made; refrigerated, the syrup settles and the lotus seeds harden.
What does travel is dried lotus seeds and candied ginger, bought at Đông Ba market.
Other Hue dishes worth trying: bánh bèo, nậm, lọc, cơm hến, nem lụi, tôm chua.
Specialties used in this dish
Mắm nêm Nhựt Hoàng – hũ 500g Prices are in Vietnamese đồng.
Food
- Bun Bo Hue — the Shrimp Paste Is What Gives the Broth Its DepthBones for sweetness, lemongrass and chilli for aroma. That thick, lingering depth behind every spoonful — that is the shrimp paste.
- Com Hen — the Poor Man's Dish, Served With Cold RiceCold rice, clams the size of a chopstick tip, and chilli heat that stops most first-timers. This is the hardest dish in Hue to get on with.
- Banh Beo, Nam, Loc and Ram It — the Hue Cake Set, Eaten TogetherNobody orders just one. People in Hue order the whole set, a few of each — and each one comes with its own dipping sauce.