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TL;DR: The Cold Food Festival on the third day of the third lunar month originated in China and tells of Jie Zitui, but Vietnamese people localized it into a day of offering floating rice cakes and sweet rice cakes to remember ancestors rather than avoiding fire, while in China this day later merged with Qingming and became associated with tomb sweeping. Floating rice cakes and sweet rice cakes symbolize completeness, yin-yang harmony, and are linked to the legend of the Dragon and Fairy descendants; floating rice cakes also appear in Hồ Xuân Hương's poem "Floating Rice Cake" as a metaphor for the fate of women in feudal times.
What is Tết Hàn Thực and where does it come from?
Tết Hàn Thực (Cold Food Festival) falls on the 3rd day of the 3rd lunar month every year, and in Vietnam it is also called the bánh trôi bánh chay festival. The name Hàn Thực in Sino-Vietnamese means eating cold food, and it comes from a Chinese legend. The story goes that during the Spring and Autumn period, Duke Wen of Jin was once in exile and was aided by the worthy scholar Jie Zitui for 19 years, who even cut flesh from his own thigh to offer the duke when he was starving. After regaining the throne, the duke forgot his merit, and Jie Zitui took his mother into the mountains to live in seclusion. When the duke remembered and sent people to find him, he ordered the forest set on fire to force him out, but unexpectedly Jie Zitui and his mother burned to death on the very day of 3/3. Heartbroken and remorseful, the duke built a shrine and ordered the people to abstain from fire for three days, eating only cold pre-cooked food.
According to the book Việt Nam phong tục by Phan Kế Bính, this custom spread to our country and the Vietnamese celebrated the festival on the 3rd day, using bánh trôi and bánh chay in place of cold food, but they only made offerings to ancestors and no one commemorated Jie Zitui, and although it bears the name hàn thực (cold food), cooking was not restricted in any way.
Compare the features of bánh trôi and bánh chay as described in the article.
| Criterion | Bánh trôi | Bánh chay |
|---|---|---|
| Wrapper ingredients | glutinous rice flour | glutinous rice flour |
| Filling | red sugar in the North, mung bean in the Central and Southern regions; the traditional filling is rock sugar, that is, cane molasses condensed into cakes | mung bean, in some places made without filling |
| Shape | small, round balls | larger, slightly flattened |
| Finishing method | boiled until they float, then sprinkled with roasted sesame, in some places shredded coconut is sprinkled instead of sesame | boiled then covered with ginger syrup or kudzu tea; in the South, coconut milk may be poured over instead of ginger syrup |
| Symbolic meaning | the 50 children who followed mother Âu Cơ up to the forest | the 50 children who followed father Lạc Long Quân down to the sea |
| Yin and yang | yang | yin |
Do Vietnamese abstain from lighting fires on Tết Hàn Thực?
Although they adopted this festival, the Vietnamese almost never keep the fire abstinence custom and also do not commemorate Jie Zitui. Researcher Phan Cẩm Thượng in his book Văn minh vật chất của người Việt cites scholar Lê Quý Đôn as saying that the cakes used in Tết Hàn Thực in the past were fried cakes, not bánh trôi and bánh chay as they are today. Author Nhất Thanh in Đất lề quê thói also emphasizes: bánh trôi and bánh chay are "poetic cakes", associated with the verse "seven floating, three sinking with water and mountains" by Hồ Xuân Hương, carrying a meaning of cool freshness for summer, unrelated to the Chinese Hàn Thực legend. Researcher Huỳnh Ngọc Trảng holds that Tết Hàn Thực belongs to the system of tứ thời tiết lạp (the seasonal festivals of the year) and at the village communal house, this festival is usually simple with flowers, fruit, sweet soup and sticky rice.
In reality, the Vietnamese make offerings to ancestors on this day and no one thinks of Jie Zitui. The popular saying "it bears the name hàn thực but cooking observes no restrictions at all" clearly shows cultural creativity: borrowing the time frame of the Chinese calendar but filling it with entirely Vietnamese content, directed toward ancestors and roots.
Compared with China, the difference is even clearer. In China, Hàn Thực later gradually merged into Thanh minh and became associated with the custom of tending graves and visiting ancestral graves. In Vietnam, this day is an occasion for making offerings of cakes at home, and people still cook normally, since boiling bánh trôi and bánh chay itself requires fire. In other words, the same name Hàn Thực but the two places follow two different directions: one leans toward solar terms and grave tending, the other leans toward the ritual of offering to ancestors at home.
What do bánh trôi and bánh chay mean on Tết Hàn Thực?
Bánh trôi is made from glutinous rice flour, shaped into small balls with red sugar filling (in the North) or mung bean filling (in the Central and Southern regions), boiled until they float, then sprinkled with roasted sesame. Bánh chay is usually larger, slightly flattened, with mung bean filling, and after boiling is covered with ginger syrup or kudzu tea. Both are made from glutinous rice flour, reflecting the long-standing wet rice civilization and honoring the labor of farmers.
More than just food, bánh trôi and bánh chay also carry layers of symbolic meaning. In the legend of the Dragon and the Fairy, the small round bánh trôi symbolizes the 50 children who followed mother Âu Cơ up to the forest, and the large flat bánh chay symbolizes the 50 children who followed father Lạc Long Quân down to the sea. The perfect round shape of bánh trôi suggests fullness and purity, while the yin-yang combination of bánh trôi (yang) and bánh chay (yin) expresses the aspiration for balance and harmony with nature.
Bánh trôi also entered Vietnamese literature through the poem "Bánh trôi nước" by the female poet Hồ Xuân Hương, opening with the two lines "My body is both white and round / Seven floating, three sinking with water and mountains". The poem is commonly read as a metaphor for the fate of women in feudal times: a pure white, full appearance but a life adrift, rising and sinking, unable to decide their own destiny. That is why, when author Nhất Thanh mentions the line "seven floating, three sinking with water and mountains" in Đất lề quê thói, he is speaking of an entire layer of literary meaning that has clung to this humble cake.
According to culinary artisan Hiền Minh, Tết Hàn Thực is distinctly popular in the North, while the South hardly makes offerings, and if it does, it is usually people of Northern origin; the Central region is usually simpler with offerings of fruit. Even so, in many families this day is an occasion to gather, shape cakes together, burn incense to offer to ancestors and enjoy the results.
Is Tết Hàn Thực the same as Tết Thanh minh?
No. These are two different occasions, although in some years they fall close together in time, which is why many people confuse them.
Tết Hàn Thực in Vietnam is fixed on the 3rd day of the 3rd lunar month, associated with the custom of making bánh trôi and bánh chay to offer to ancestors. Thanh minh, by contrast, is one of the 24 solar terms, not a fixed lunar date, and begins around April 4 or 5 of the solar calendar each year, associated with the custom of tending graves and repairing ancestral graves. Because Hàn Thực is calculated by the lunar calendar while Thanh minh is calculated by solar terms, in some years the two occasions fall close together and in others far apart, so the two days cannot be considered one.
If you want to go deeper into the grave-tending occasion, please read the article Thanh Minh Festival and the Distinctive Grave-Visiting Custom of the Vietnamese.
What does the Tết Hàn Thực offering tray include and how do you make delicious cakes?
The traditional Tết Hàn Thực offering tray in the North usually includes bánh trôi, bánh chay, xôi oản, fresh flowers (ngọc thiên hương, jasmine, hoàng lan), betel and areca, a five-fruit tray and clean water. Many families also add bánh xu xê and bánh phu thê. Ms. Vũ Thu Hương (Hanoi) shares that bánh trôi and bánh chay are tastiest when made from freshly ground glutinous rice flour, creating a soft, smooth elasticity and a faintly sour characteristic aroma.
To get a good batch of cakes, the dough should be kneaded with moderately warm water: cold water makes the dough crack and hard to shape, while scalding hot water cooks the dough and makes it sticky. Sweet potato can be mixed in to make the cakes soft and give them a nice color. When boiling, wait for the cakes to float, then lower the heat so they cook evenly and do not break, then scoop them out and drop them into a bowl of cold water before dipping them in sesame.
What is the spiritual meaning of Tết Hàn Thực?
Tết Hàn Thực in Vietnam is an occasion for descendants to show reverence and gratitude to ancestors and to look toward their roots, and it is also a bridge between past and present. Offering cakes on the altar is not only a ritual but also a way for each person to remind themselves of their cultural identity and roots. In the modern context, this custom is still preserved, and even spreads to overseas Vietnamese, as in the story of Ms. Kỳ Duyên who still shapes traditional bánh trôi and bánh chay in a foreign land to ease her homesickness.
The transformation from the Chinese custom of abstaining from fire into the Vietnamese day of offering bánh trôi and bánh chay shows the vigorous vitality of national culture: selective absorption, turning the foreign into one's own, both solemn and familiar, both sacred and everyday.
Overview article on the topic: What Festivals and Tet Occasions Are There in Vietnam Throughout the Year?
