☔ The Things We Eat When It Rains – Vietnamese Comfort Food for Stormy Days

☔ The Things We Eat When It Rains – Vietnamese Comfort Food for Stormy Days
When the rain comes,
Vietnam slows down.

Shutters close.
Children press their cheeks against the glass.
Mothers light a fire, or at least, start warming something up.
And kitchens fill with the scent of what we always cook
when the skies turn grey.

 
🌧️ A Childhood Soaked in Rain and Broth
I grew up in the Mekong Delta, where rain wasn’t just water — it was a season, a mood, and a rhythm.
And whenever it rained hard, we knew two things for sure:

We couldn’t go out
We’d be fed something warm and familiar
My earliest memories of rainy season are tied to the gentle bitterness of canh khổ qua — stuffed bitter melon soup, bubbling in a clay pot on the stove. My mother would slice the melons and fill them with pork, glass noodles, and a bit of black mushroom, her hands working fast while the thunder rolled outside.

I hated it as a child.
I didn’t understand why we had to eat something that tasted sad.

Now, as an adult, I cook it on rainy nights —
and it tastes like home.

 
🔥 What the Rain Taught Me About Warmth
My husband, who also grew up in the Mekong Delta, shares his own rainy day memory:
a bowl of cháo cá lóc (snakehead fish rice porridge), eaten on the floor of a wooden house, his clothes still wet from riding home.

He remembers the steam, the scent of fried shallots,
and his mother handing him the bowl with a dry shirt in the same gesture.

It wasn’t just food.
It was comfort, wrapped in warmth and silence.
Sometimes, when we travel and get caught in the rain — in Đà Lạt, Huế, or Hội An — we don’t run for cover.
We walk slower.
And we look for cháo.

Not because we’re cold,
but because we miss that kind of care.

 
🥢 Rainy Day Staples – Not Recipes, but Rituals
Here’s what we eat when the sky cries:

Bánh đúc nóng – soft rice flour cake in a savory broth, topped with minced pork and fried onions
Bún riêu – crab and tomato noodle soup, steaming red-orange, lifted with lime
Bắp xào mỡ hành – stir-fried corn with scallion oil and dried shrimp, sold on street corners under umbrellas
Khoai lang nướng – roasted sweet potatoes, sold from smoky carts near bus stops
Chuối hấp nước cốt dừa – steamed banana soaked in warm coconut milk, often made from whatever’s in the kitchen
And always — always — trà gừng nóng (hot ginger tea),
served in chipped cups, warming the belly and the heart.

 
👫 One Rainy Trip, One Shared Bowl
Last autumn, we were caught in a storm in Huế.
Everything was closed.
We found shelter under a tarpaulin where a lady was selling bánh canh cá lóc.

She didn’t smile much.
She just handed us two bowls and pointed to the bench.

We ate in silence,
rain tapping metal roofs above,
no words between us except for the quiet joy of broth and steam.

When we got up to leave, she simply said:
“Trời mưa mà ăn nóng mới ấm bụng.”

In English:
“It’s raining — a hot meal warms the stomach.”
But really, it warms the soul.
 
🌙 When It Rains, We Remember
Rain in Vietnam doesn’t ask us to stay inside.
It invites us inward — to our memories, our kitchens, our comfort.

The food we eat when it rains is never fancy.
It’s humble, hot, and always made with care.

And years from now, when we’re in another city, another country,
and the sky opens up —
we won’t remember the storm.

We’ll remember the bowl.

 
Next up:
📖 In the Land of Fish Sauce – How Vietnam Turns Fermentation into Magic