Ta Dung has a "little hero"
Still knowing that in the vast Central Highlands, there will be many place names that sound very curious but do not understand anything like Gia Nghia. Suddenly, in the middle of the very Central Highlands capitals like Buon Ma Thuot, Pleiku, Kon Tum, Da Lat... there is a very lowland city of Gia Nghia, with no trace of the Highlands that Toan Anh wrote about.
However, Gia Nghia is still not as mysterious as Ta Dung, a very puzzling place name. Is it related to the chain of place names starting with the word Ta such as Ta Nang (Duc Trong - Lam Dong) of the salt route to Ninh Thuan, Ta Cu mountain in Phan Thiet, Ta Xua peak (Tram Tau, Yen Bai) or the infamous Ta De village in Son La?
A colleague from Dak Nong Newspaper who was sent to “escort” us explained: Ta Dung is the name of a delicious sugarcane variety that used to grow abundantly here before the hills and mountains became lakes and islands. The place where this sugarcane variety grew was called B’nam Tao Dung Mountain (mountain with big sugarcane). Perhaps, after being recorded in Vietnamese, B’nam Tao Dung became Ta Dung.
So that's the end of the big question like Ta Dung. This is sugarcane, not "high water" although this is a magnificent hanging lake of the Central Highlands, formed by blocking the upper Dong Nai River to build hydroelectric power (Dong Nai 3 Hydroelectric Plant).
Ta Dung Lake is a vast 3,600 hectares with 47 large and small islands creating a spectacular landscape, similar to Ha Long Bay and familiar to Na Hang Lake or Hoa Binh Lake. However, the density of islands in Ta Dung Lake is dense and runs parallel, creating a majestic landscape with geometric lines of a lost civilization.
After admiring the scenery of Ta Dung Lake with its large white birds like cormorants flying in the wind and rain, my stomach suddenly growled with hunger. The sad scene did not make me feel sad, but the cold made me hungry quickly. The sudden cold made me daydream about delicious fish such as catfish, bream, and green dam fish in Na Hang Lake. Until a tiny plate of fish was brought up.
What is this? Sir, this is fried dried bream. Oh my god, in such a huge lake, there are only fish as small as needles like this? There are catfish, snakehead fish, and other fish, but the most precious thing is this small but delicious bream.
Ah, so that's it, small but mighty, small but very delicious. Worthy of being called the little hero of this lake. Throwing a dried fish as big as a finger, about 4cm long, the skinned and orange meat into the mouth, chewing it, it was crispy like a burst of laughter and had a very distinctive aroma.
The taste was quite good, so I added a handful of 2-3 fish to chew for pleasure and immediately got “hit”. It was indeed a fish that was like a harpoon, although tiny, its teeth were sharp, immediately cutting into the gums and jaws of the greedy person. Later, when I learned more, I found out that the teeth of the harpoon were also mentioned in a folk song:
Mom, the duck drowned.
I reached out to grab it, the fish bit my hand...
Small but mighty fish
Hermiramphidae, the scientific name of the fish, likes to live in the surface water layer. The peak season for the fish is from the beginning of the 10th lunar month to the end of the 12th lunar month, which is right at this time. In Ta Dung Lake, fishermen often use small mesh nets to catch the fish, but they cannot be raised.
The pliers are quite resilient and flexible, growing well in fresh, salt and brackish water. They are called pliers because the shape of the fish's mouth is quite similar to a long, sharp beaked pliers. But in other regions, the pliers are called by a more confusing name, the pliers.
However, whether called Kim fish or Kim Kim, the characteristic pincer-shaped mouth with the lower jaw longer than the upper jaw is still a common feature of Kim fish. On the outside, Kim fish is silvery white, with thin and not hard scales. The fish has a long, cylindrical or slightly flattened body, transparent white. Kim fish living in brackish water are usually slightly larger than Kim fish living in salt water.
So how delicious is the fish of Ta Dung Lake to be considered a typical specialty, surpassing other larger fish? As mentioned above, fish can only be caught and not farmed, so they are a completely natural product, like the earthworm in Thai Binh, Hai Duong or the sea worm in the Red River.
Fresh lim kim fish is often processed into many attractive dishes, typical of the "river delta" such as braised lim kim fish with pepper, lim kim fish cooked with squash soup, fresh lim kim fish braised with turmeric, lemongrass, chili, and coconut milk. These are delicious dishes that I have enjoyed when wandering the West, but did not know that they were lim kim fish, because of the name lim kim.
In my notes, in the place where the fish is called Lim Kim, the fresh fish is caught, the head and tail are removed, the belly is slit open, the intestines are squeezed out, and then drained. Then the fish is marinated with minced fresh lemongrass, minced chili, crushed fresh turmeric, salt, spices and a spoonful of sugar, for about 30 minutes to absorb. Before putting the pot on the stove, add a spoonful of fish sauce to enhance the aroma and make the fish firmer.
Small fish should be cooked quickly, when the aroma spreads, let the fire simmer, not enough to reduce the water by 50%. At this time, add more coconut milk to cover the fish and turn up the heat to boil the pot of fish, then remove from heat. Take the fish out into a bowl to eat with rice, and use the fish sauce to dip raw vegetables including thinly sliced green banana flower, cucumber, and tomato. It is delicious and goes well with rice.
In addition to turmeric and coconut milk stew, fresh scad fish is also often stewed with pepper. When stewing with pepper, you need to watch the heat carefully so that the fish is dry but not burnt, the meat is tender, the spicy aroma of green pepper is absorbed into the meat, the bones are soft enough to eat. The dish of scad fish stewed with pepper is known as the "rice killer" on cold, rainy days.
Not only can you braise and cook fish soup, you can also make a very attractive fried fish dish. The fish is cleaned, then cut into the body with a knife, then marinated with salt and minced chili for about 15 minutes. Then deep-fry in hot oil in a pan until it is crispy and hard when you use chopsticks to stir it, then take it out, drain the oil and put it on a plate.
This is a very tasty snack, not only loved by Liu Ling's disciples but also by gourmets. Take the crispy fried fish and place it on a bowl of fresh noodles, raw vegetables, then sprinkle a few spoons of spicy - sour - sweet fish sauce and eat it with fresh garlic, green pepper, and chili pepper. We can say "it's really delicious".
But the best is always the dried scad fish. In Ta Dung Lake, there are two types of dried scad fish. The intermediate grade is the whole dried scad fish, the superior grade is the dried scad fish that has been split in half, gutted, and decapitated before being dried. This is the type of scad fish that is on the plate in front of me, making inviting crackling sounds.
Strangely enough, the fish had been split in half, its body was so thin that it was translucent (allowing light to pass through), but it had a strange, alluring aroma that was difficult to describe with a pen. The unique delicious taste of the fish was completely different from dried squid, dried sea worm, dried pineapple fish... or any other type of dried fish.
