The first time setting foot in the S-shaped land, Flo - a young man from Germany was invited by his Vietnamese companion to register for a cooking tour in the Buffalo Cave area (in Dam Khe, Ninh Hai commune, Hoa Lu district, Ninh Binh province).

This destination is located in the Tam Coc - Bich Dong complex recognized by UNESCO as a World Natural Heritage, about 100km from Hanoi city.

This place attracts many foreign tourists to experience activities associated with agricultural culture and local people's lives.

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Flo (left) and her Vietnamese friend joined a cooking tour at Trau Cave (Hoa Lu, Ninh Binh)

The list provided includes Vietnamese dishes such as grilled pork rolls, steamed rice rolls, fried cakes, etc. Flo decided to choose the spring roll making class because this is a local dish loved by many foreign diners.

During the 2-hour class, the German boy listened attentively to the chef introduce the ingredients to make Northern-style spring rolls and carefully observed the process of preparing this dish.

Although it was his first time wrapping spring rolls, the Westerner was quite skillful in his practice. In no time, he had finished making small, neat spring rolls. He was then instructed on how to fry the spring rolls so that the skin was crispy and had an attractive golden color.

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First time wrapping spring rolls but the Western customer learned very quickly

Not only Flo, some other foreign tourists present in the class also expressed excitement and interest in the experience of wrapping spring rolls.

“I love Vietnamese food so I signed up for this class to better understand the local culinary culture, as well as learn how to prepare delicious dishes,” said Cantero Jim (a Spanish tourist).

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Cantero Jim went to Buffalo Cave to experience activities imbued with the culture and life of the indigenous people, including learning to cook. Photo: @cantero_jim

Sharing with VietNamNet reporter, representative of the unit providing cooking tour in Trau cave said that the class lasts about 2 hours and limits the number of participants.

“Each class has 1 chef participating in guiding about 6 tourists. They can choose to learn to cook 1 of the dishes provided by the unit such as banh cuon, banh don, banh xeo… Among them, nem and cha la lot are the 2 dishes chosen most by foreign tourists.

During the class, visitors will be able to prepare ingredients themselves such as picking betel leaves, raw vegetables, etc. and listen to the tour guide share about how Vietnamese people use spices in the cooking process," said the representative.

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Western tourists excitedly join spring roll wrapping class in Ninh Binh

The cost to join the Vietnamese cooking tour here is from 20 USD/person (more than 500,000 VND).

Tours are open year-round and can be adapted for guests with special requests such as vegetarianism, limited spices, or allergies to certain ingredients/materials, etc.

In addition to cooking, foreign visitors can sign up for other rustic tours such as buffalo riding, rice planting, traditional hand embroidery, and fishing with traps.

Photo: Buffalo Cave

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