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Be merry with
Van’s brandy at Old hanoi Restaurant
LEGEND ON VAN VILLAGE AND ITS BRANDY DISTILLING CRAFT
A. ORIGIN OF VAN VILLAGE
In the far past, Van village site was a thick forest area, a hilly
landscape surrounded on three sides by Cau River water streams.
According to legend, when Van village founding fathers, then running
away from enemies and under the search for a peaceful place where
they could live for long, arrived at Cau River bank, they saw beyond
the river a forest which looked like a small oasis. They
spontaneously believed it was a good area for a long term stable
settlement, and actually this area has become Van village of today.
At the beginning, on the map Van village bore the name of “Yen Vien
village”. (Yen means peaceful, and Vien means garden; Yen Vien
reflected the wish to live a long term peaceful life).
B. TRADITIONAL BRANDY DISTILLING CRAFT AND THE CHANGE OF THE
VILLAGE NAME FROM YEN VIEN TO VAN VILLAGE
Perhaps nobody thinks that the person who has given birth to brandy
distilling craft in Van village was a woman. Her name was “Nghi Dinh”
and she is called by Van village of today “ancestor of brandy
distilling craft” as a manner of expressing gratitude to her. Van
village inhabitants, regarding her as a saint, still call her with
another sacred name “Van Village Saint Ancestor”. They have taken
the date of 7th of first lunar month as her anniversary of death
which is celebrated annually in Doc Pagoda, previously called “Quang
Lam Pagoda”.
Under feudal monarchic dynasties, pitchers of Van Village Brandy
were considered to be precious gifts for offering to the kings. This
was also a “high standard drink” which could not be absent in
banquets of royal court. By this reason, the village has been
granted by reigning king the honorary title of “My Tuu Kha Phong”
which meant praiseworthy high standard brandy.
As a drink of 45-50o, Van Village Brandy has a combined flavor of
delicious smell, strong, sweet and sour taste and a penetrating
effect. Van village has a traditional test of distilled brandy,
scarcely known by people. After a distilled batch, a tube from a
type of baby bamboo of 1.5 to 2 cm diameter is used for sucking
distilled brandy for test. The tube filled with alcoholic liquid is
held at 20 cm above a bowl, into which the brandy is released. If
bulbs are formed evenly on the liquid surface, distilled product is
judged to reach 45o; if more bulbs are formed, the drink
concentration will be about 50o. If the bulbs are formed unevenly,
the brandy must be distilled again.
At that time Van Village Brandy distilling procedure is considered
to be an esoteric craft. In a family it could not be transferred to
any daughter or son-in-law, but must be passed on only to a son or
daughter-in-law, the persons regarded as attaching themselves to the
village until their death.
By the same reason, to marry a girl from Van village is also a hard
problem to boys from other villages. Therefore a popular song has
since long ran through neighboring villages:
“Let banyan leaves get wet from rain,
I bet one can hardly marry a Van Village woman”
Legend says that at the banyan foot, beside village pagoda, there
was in the past a piece of blue stone. At that time, on every 7th
day of 1st month, representatives of 12 distilling families of the
village came there with as offering a white cock which they killed
while letting its blood drop down the stone then flow into a cup of
brandy which was then shared among attendants who swore “never to
transmit brandy distilling craft to outsiders”.
However in 1930, when Dai Viet country lived under French
colonialism domination, a French officer named Bernard, aware of the
village famous traditional skill in distilling good brandy, has come
to the place to savor this product. He has had a distillery built in
the village, which was called by villagers “Brandy Lot”. When
batches of good brandy have been distilled in the village, the
product was bottled and transferred by the French to their country,
under the name of “Van Village Quality Brandy”. As the name of Van
village is easier to speak and to remember, brandy connoisseurs have
adopted the toponym put on the drink bottle label as the name of
this village, and the name of Van Village has come into life since
then while the name of Yen Vien Village has been gradually
forgotten.
It was told that when Prime Minister Pham Van Dong came once in
France for attending a conference, he was offered in a reception of
French President a kind of rice brandy very delicious and very
familiar. But only when he saw the label with four words “Van
Village Quality Brandy”, he realized that this was the rice brandy
bottled in Van village by the French and stored as a precious drink.
Above stories about Van village show that Van Village Brandy has
become since long one of characteristics of Vietnamese culture and
people.
1. The main ingredient of ruou lang Van is a fine grade of rice
known as nep cai or “mother of rice”, cooked husk and all into a
sticky, flavorful paste.
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