Rainy-season treat in central Vietnam: cricket-filled ‘banh xeo’

Over the past few days, heavy rains have fallen one after another.

In just a single night, the rice fields, riverbanks, and streams of my homeland– the former Quang Nam Province, now part of Da Nang City, have disappeared beneath vast expanses of floodwater.

Adults anxiously watch the sky, worrying that vegetable gardens, cornfields, and crops may be swept away.

However, in the memories of children from my generation, the flood season brought a particular kind of excitement: it was a cricket-catching season.

Rain poured relentlessly, and gusts of wind swept through the trees, yet the children eagerly put on conical hats and raincoats, going barefoot or wearing old sandals as they followed their fathers to the riverbank fields.

The icy water numbed their hands and feet.

I was once one of those children who scampered after my father to catch crickets whenever the rains caused the fields to flood.

The moment someone spotted a cricket clinging to a branch, the whole group would shout and race toward it.

The sandy riverbanks along the Tuy Loan River, normally lush with vegetables and crops, became ideal hunting grounds when the floodwaters rose.

Crickets live in dry burrows underground and feed on grass and leaves.

When floodwater pours into their burrows, they are forced to crawl to the surface and cling to branches and grass.

That is when local people will seize the opportunity to go cricket hunting.

This year, there are fewer crickets than usual because the floods arrived early.

Once the crickets were brought home, my whole family would gather to process them.

The task sounds simple, but it is surprisingly painstaking: removing the wings, trimming the spiny legs, cleaning out the innards and soaking the crickets in salted water.

My mother often treated my family to cricket-filled banh xeo.

The batter is made from rice flour mixed with turmeric, with onions, bean sprouts and fresh herbs, while the filling also includes plump, juicy crickets.

When the pan is hot, the batter is poured into it and the pan is tilted, making the pancake spread into a thin layer.

As the pancake begins to crisp, the crickets and bean sprouts are placed in the center.

Cricket banh xeo is best eaten immediately, while it is still hot.

The crisp pancake combines with the rich, nutty flavor of the crickets, the fragrance of rice flour, the heat of chilli, the pungency of ginger and young turmeric leaves, and the gentle bitterness of young banana.

Everything is wrapped in fresh herbs and dipped into a bowl of mam nem (a fermented sauce made from fish) mixed with roasted peanuts, crushed garlic and chilli.

On cold, rainy days, the whole family sits around the glowing wood stove, listening to the rain falling outside the porch while eating and talking.

There is nothing luxurious about these moments, yet they represent a kind of happiness.

Now my hair is beginning to turn gray, but whenever heavy rain pours down across central Vietnam, those old memories return.

Some dishes pass through our lives and disappear, while others remain, becoming part of our memories.

For me, dishes made out of crickets in the flood season are part of unforgettable memories.

They carry the richness of the countryside, the spicy warmth of the wood stove, the earthy saltiness of the land and, above all, the sweetness of a father’s and mother’s love–a taste from a poor but warm childhood.