The people of Hue, no one knows exactly since when, but on the full moon (15th day) and the first day of each lunar month, many eateries close, and quite a few meat and fish stalls at the market also stop selling. Many places that normally serve meat-based dishes switch to vegetarian food instead.

As part of the celebrations for Vesak 2570 (Buddhist Era) and Hue Festival 2026, the Vegetarian Food Festival - Hue Festival 2026 officially opened on the afternoon of May 28th (the 12th day of the fourth lunar month) at the riverside area along the Perfume River. The event is jointly organized by the Executive Board of the Vietnam Buddhist Sangha in Hue City and the Organizing Committee of Hue Festival 2026.

On May 28 and 29 (corresponding to the 12th and 13th days of the Lunar April), Nguyen Dinh Chieu Pedestrian Street will be transformed into a large-scale and distinctive vegetarian culinary space for the Vegetarian Food Festival - Hue Festival 2026.

On the Lantern Festival (the Full Moon of the First Lunar Month) more than 15 years ago, the most “pure Hue native” friend I know, architect Nguyen Trong Huan, and I put on thin raincoats and walked together through the light, drifting drizzle to search for Hue’s culinary specialties. Having lived in this city for many years, Huan still longed for the flavors he once tasted.

Hue Ancient Capital is a paradise for vegetarian cuisine. On the first and fifteenth days of the lunar month, even restaurants that usually serve meat often switch entirely to vegetarian dishes. This is hardly surprising, given that Hue is one of Vietnam’s major Buddhist centers, a land steeped in spiritual traditions, where eating vegetarian food has become a beautiful cultural feature.

Along with the non-vegetarian banh goi (wrapped cakes) once offered to the emperor, vegetarian banh goi has been closely tied to the childhood of many generations of people from Huong Can Village (Huong Toan Commune, Huong Tra Town).

Talking about Hue cuisine, tourists always give compliments, a special highlight of which is Hue vegetarian cuisine. Tapping the value of vegetarian cuisine for tourism is partly an opening to promote tourism and partly a contribution to preserving and promoting the value of Hue vegetarian cuisine.

Thua Thien Hue is a region with many dishes honored in the “Journey to find the cultural value of typical Vietnamese cuisine” including Hue beef noodles, tapioca dumplings stuffed with roasted pork sweet soup, mussel rice, tapioca dumplings, mixed vegetarian fig salad, vegetarian rice steamed in lotus leaf.

Thua Thien Hue has the most dishes honored in Phase I of the project, including Hue beef noodle soup, tapioca dumpling stuffed with roasted pork sweet soup, mussel rice, tapioca dumplings, vegetarian fig salad, and vegetarian steamed rice wrapped in lotus leaf.

These are 6 of 121 Vietnamese culinary dishes that have just been honored by the Vietnam Cuisine Culture Association (VCCA) as typical national dishes in phase I of a project titled "Building and Developing Vietnamese Culinary Culture into a National Brand Name”. All of these 6 dishes, including: Hue beef noodle soup, glutinous rice dumplings stuffed with roasted pork in sweet soup, mussel rice, banh loc (glutinous rice dumplings), vegetarian fig salad, and lotus-leaf-wrapped steamed rice; all are close to the gardens and paddy fields of the land.