Oh how I wish I could get my hands on a traditional husband-and-wife sweet right now. If you want to know what it looks like (properly made, not just homemade for family consumption) then go here.

A must-have for a traditional wedding in Central Vietnam (or for people coming from that region), the name for the sweet is bánh phu thê (or su sê), and presentation is of the utmost important because of what it stands for. The box that contains the sweet is made out of fresh coconut leaves, with the top symbolizes the protective husband and the bottom symbolizes the nurturing wife. The work that goes into preparing this sweet is in the making of the box. Without the box you lose the meaning of the sweet, so why bother? While I can understand the need to fill the voracious appetite of the mass, any shortcut in this case (the site linked to above also has a picture of the shortcut version) I would say is detriment to the sweet, giving first-time eaters the wrong impression, which they don’t deserve. Why dumb down such a terrific sweet?

But apart from the box, what it contains within tastes so good in itself. It is a bit chewy, with coconut flavor, best when you use fresh ingredients including the coconut leaves and strips of fresh coconut meat. The coconut leaf box imparts a scent that can’t be replicated otherwise. I remembered when a kid, there were never enough of these sweets to go around, they were the choice sweet of a wedding.