Communist Flavour Pie

Vietnam is a place that is full of contradictions and difficult to understand. The population is still fed a heavy diet of communist propaganda, yet it in reality it is hardly even socialist. Capitalism is king and the gears of power are greased by the flow of money. All well and good I hear you say but how does this affect the pie market in Vietnam? Good question. One of the good things is that the new consumerism in Vietnam means that if pies are demanded then someone will supply pies to the market. The downside is that now people would have to pay for their pies. I would argue that pies are an unassailable human right, however this still seems like a distant dream.

I was quite prepared to part with some Vietnamese Dong if only I could get hold of a pie. Fortunately in the border town of Chau Doc near the Mekong river I came across someone selling desserts from a trolley by the side of the street. There was something that looked just like a lattice pie being sold for about 10p each. Unfortunately due to the proprietor of the establishment not speaking English this made it difficult to know what the product actually was. I had to take the risk. Upon biting into the product the cross-section revealed that this was indeed a pie. However the flavour was about as confusing as the politics of Vietnam. It looked like coconut but actually tasted like a crystallised sugar but wasn't overly sweet. It had a kinda starchy taste which reminded me of rice. I wonder if it might have had coconut sugar in it. So what did I think? The pastry was nice and flaky, however there perhaps was a lack of pastry due to the lattice top. The filling was weird, especially as I didn't really know what it was but tasted nice enough. I don't think this can be an official review as I don't know the flavour and would struggle to tell you where to go to get another one. However I have included a score in case you ever come across a similar looking product, it's worth a try!


3.46/7
SJL