Hai Phong is one of the localities with many advantages to develop craft villages associated with tourism, because of the cultural value, long history, and beautiful natural landscape. Crystallized from simple ingredients, processing ingenuity and long-standing professional experience, Nong Xa Craft Village, An Duong District is the place where make delicious red rice noodles that is famous throughout the country.
The red rice noodle of Nong Xa Craft Village (Photo: Collection)
It is 15km far from the city center and only 20 minutes traveling by car, you will be at Nong Xa Village, Tan Tien Commune, An Duong District, Hai Phong City, which contributes to the typical crab noodle dish of Hai Phong.
The red rice noodle is an indispensable ingredient of the special crab noodle bowl of Hai Phong (Photo: Collection)
The special thing is that the red rice noodle of Nong Xa has a typical red color, made entirely from natural ingredients, so the noodle is shiny, and fragrant and still retains its color when cooking as well as is safe for the health of diners. The craftsman requires a meticulous working attitude. Choosing rice is a very important first step in the process of making rice noodles. It requires the rice to have a good leaven, natural aroma... The rice is picked up from grits and then soaked in cold water for about 1 hour for summer, or 10 hours for winter.
Natural sun-dried rice noodles will be delicious, chewy, and preserved for a longer time. (Photo: Vu Loan)
There are two types of noodles, if you want to make white noodles, just use rice flour, and if you want to make red noodles (crab noodles), use condensed cane sugar to make bitter candies. Mill rice into a fine powder, then pour the powdered liquid onto the fabric of the coating machine to run through the heat of the boiler. After completing the coating process, the rice noodle will be spread out the bamboo wattles, dried on the brazier and mainly take advantage of sunlight. When the noodle is relatively dry, stack them on top of each other, and use a stone mortar to press and cut them into small ones of about 0.2 - 1cm depending on the requirements of customers.
Finished noodles include two types: dry noodles are sold to other provinces, or used as gifts; wet noodles are sold right in the commune and surrounding areas.
For people who made noodles for a long time and had a lot of experience, the taste of rice noodles is the most important one that made the difference and popularity of Hai Phong rice noodles compared to the products of other regions. But to get the good taste of noodles, the rice must be delicious, white and sun-dried.
Instead of the hand-slicing process, the noodle is now using the machine-slicing process for beautiful uniform ones. (Photo: Vu Loan)
With the desire to maintain and develop the traditional rice noodle production of the homeland, the households in Nong Xa Village have invested in modern machines instead of manual methods to improve productivity, and product quality.
The method of producing rice noodles by the traditional charcoal oven. (Photo: Vu Loan)
The batches of rice noodles that are delicious, crispy,and chewy are still daily and hourly made from skillful, industrious, labor-loving craftsmen of Nong Xa Craft Village. This is a typical craft village, both contributing to preserving and developing the craft village and promoting traditional cultural values, as well as creating jobs and improving the living standard of the local people./.