Drinking Traditions of Hue: 6 Local Beverages That Define a City

Hue’s drinking traditions reflect a landscape of river flats, lagoons, and forested highlands. The Perfume River, the Tam Giang Lagoon, and nearby paddy fields shape a rice-first palate, while cool evenings and humid summers encourage light, aromatic spirits served in small cups.

As the former imperial capital, Hue retains courtly rituals alongside village craft. Rice wines are distilled in clay or copper setups, herbal liqueurs trace palace-era recipes, and communal jar wines thrive in A Luoi’s highland communities—each woven into ceremonies, markets, and family tables.

An Truyền—better known as Chuồn Village—in Phú Vang near the Tam Giang Lagoon is famous for clear, fragrant rice spirit. The base is steamed white rice inoculated with bánh men (traditional yeast cakes made from rice flour and medicinal herbs). After a warm, controlled fermentation, distillers use an earthen pot still with a bamboo or metal coil cooled by water. The first run is collected for clarity and aroma; many households perform a second distillation for balance. Bottled clear and typically unaged, the spirit sits at about 38–45% ABV. Expect a clean rice perfume, faint banana esters, and a peppery warmth. Historically, it fueled village feasts, ancestor offerings, and wedding banquets; today you’ll find it poured in tiny cups at countryside seafood huts around Đầm Chuồn and at family gatherings in Hue. Locals sip it neat, room temperature, alongside briny clams, grilled mullet, or pungent fermented shrimp sauce—flavors that the spirit’s dry finish neatly cuts.

Linked to Nguyen-dynasty pharmacopoeia, Rượu Minh Mạng is a herbal macerate whose modern versions are produced by Hue apothecaries and specialty shops. A base rice spirit (30–40% ABV) is infused for weeks with a curated mix that commonly includes đinh lăng (Polyscias), đương quy (Angelica), kỷ tử (goji), cam thảo (licorice), ba kích, and warming spices; some recipes add dried longan or ginseng substitutes to round bitterness with gentle sweetness. The result is an amber liqueur around 25–35% ABV, bittersweet and resinous, with a rooty aroma, light honeyed notes, and a slow, chest-warming finish. Historically served in thimble-sized cups at court, it survives as a ceremonial and medicinal-style drink rather than a casual pour. Visitors encounter it at imperial-cuisine dinners, specialty counters near the Citadel, and reputable traditional medicine centers. It’s typically enjoyed after a meal or as a small nightcap, paired with refined Hue dishes—steamed bánh bèo, delicate lotus-stem salads—that let its herbal complexity linger.

Hue’s longstanding trầu cau (betel-and-areca) custom finds a fragrant echo in Rượu mộng cau, where young betel inflorescences are lightly sun-dried and steeped in rice spirit. The technique is straightforward: a neutral, well-made rice liquor (often 30–40% ABV) is charged with the blossoms for several days to a few weeks, then filtered. The infusion yields a pale, slightly green-gold spirit with a gentle pepper-and-clove note, mentholated lift, and the faint sweetness characteristic of betel flowers rather than the nut. On the palate it’s clean, floral, and delicately spicy, finishing dry. Culturally, it appears at engagement rituals and weddings as a perfumed nod to Hue’s refined social etiquette; families may also bring a small bottle when visiting elders during the first days of the Lunar New Year. You’ll find it in small batches at family-run liquor stalls and traditional gift shops. Best served neat in tiny cups, it pairs with candied ginger, roasted sesame sweets, or simply sipped between toasts during the ceremony.

In the highland district of A Lưới, the Tà Ôi, Pa Cô, and Cơ Tu communities maintain rượu cần—communal jar wine—brewed for festivals and rites of passage. Glutinous rice or cassava is steamed, cooled, and mixed with men lá, a forest-leaf yeast culture that seeds wild fermentation. The mash is packed into glazed earthenware jars, sealed with leaves, and left to ferment and mature for one to three months. At drinking time, water is gently added, and long bamboo straws are inserted; participants sip in turn, the liquid refreshing itself as water percolates through the fermented bed. Strength varies with age and dilution, usually around 8–18% ABV. Expect a tangy, lightly sweet profile with lactic, grain, and earth aromas, sometimes a faint smokiness from toasted rice. Rượu cần anchors new rice celebrations, weddings, and community welcomes, especially in cool evenings around a hearth. Travelers can experience it in A Lưới villages and select cultural performances in Hue, where sharing the jar is as important as the drink itself.

Hue’s lotus culture—once famed at Tịnh Tâm Lake and along the Perfume River—inspires rượu sen, a floral rice-wine infusion crafted by small producers. Clean rice spirit (often 25–35% ABV) is layered with lotus stamens or gently roasted seeds and left to macerate one to two weeks before careful filtration. The infusion softens the spirit’s edges, yielding a pale gold liquor with a delicate lotus perfume, hints of almond and young hay, and a lightly sweet, tea-like finish. It’s an elegant apéritif or digestif that aligns with the city’s royal cuisine: subtle, aromatic, and restrained. You’ll encounter it in riverside restaurants, on dinner cruises, and at specialty shops packaging local gifts. Locals serve it cool in small cups at dusk, sometimes alongside shrimp-and-pork bánh lọc or lotus-stem salads that echo the beverage’s fragrance. While modern in production, the drink clearly channels Hue’s appreciation for perfumed foods and gentle flavors shaped by warm days and breezy river nights.

Rượu nếp than, made from heirloom black or purple glutinous rice, bridges food and drink in Hue’s festive calendar. The rice is soaked, steamed, and inoculated with men rượu (yeast balls), then fermented in cool ceramic jars. Short ferments yield cơm rượu—pleasantly boozy rice grains eaten like a dessert—while longer, wetter ferments produce a vivid magenta wine of about 8–12% ABV. Expect jammy rice notes, faint banana and sake-like aromas, and a soft, lightly tart finish. It appears at family tables during Tết and the Đoan Ngọ “pest-killing” festival, when a spoonful of fermented rice is thought to aid digestion in hot weather. Sold by weight at chợ like Đông Ba or made at home, it’s served chilled in small bowls or cups, sometimes with a pinch of sesame salt. In some households the wine is later distilled into a richer, cocoa-tinted spirit, but the un-distilled version remains the seasonal favorite, suited to Hue’s humid summers and communal meals.