Can Tho (VNA)- On a recent sunny day, Phan Thi Kim Ngan, 53, wore an old palm-leaf conicalhat, as she removed the cover of a barrel containing traditional fish sauce inher garden in Con Son commune in the Mekong Delta city of Can Tho.

Ngan’s family is the onlyhousehold in the commune still making the traditional fish sauce from Siamesemud carp and freshwater anchovy.

The Siamese mud carp andfreshwater anchovy often appear in local rivers between October and Februaryfollowing the lunar calendar each year, Ngan said.

The fish sauce makingprocess begins when she buys the fresh fish from local fishermen. Then, thefish is washed with water, put into barrels and marinated with salt.

Ngan said that for the bestquality of traditional fish sauce, the salt should be the type of salt that wasdried for a long time in the Mekong Delta province of Bac Lieu.

“The kind of salt will makethe fish sauce have the strong taste as it should,” she said.

The ratio is 15 kilos ofsalt for every 30 kilos of freshwater anchovy, Nong thon ngay nay (Countrysidetoday) newspaper reported.

For the Siamese mud carp,the recipe is a little more complicated. In the first four hours, she puts sixkilos of salt into every 30 kilos of the Siamese mud carp. In the next 24hours, she continues pouring an additional nine kilos of salt.

Then, the fish is kept inthe barrels with tight covers for nine to 12 months. She decides when the fishis ready based on the smell. When the smell is right, she will take boththe fish and the sauce for boiling. Finally, after she filters the fish bones,she gets a pot of fish sauce.

“Every 30 kilos of fishwill produce about 22 litres of traditional fish sauce,” she added.

The typical price for alitre of traditional fish sauce is about 30,000 VND (1.32 USD). Ngan said shebought about 300-500 kilos of the two types of fish for making the traditionalfish sauce each year.

At first, Ngan just wantedto make the traditional fish sauce for family usage and then to sell to localresidents as well as tourists.

Two years ago, arepresentative of a major domestic fish sauce firm came and asked her whethershe wanted to sell her traditional fish sauce for them. They would buy thetraditional fish sauce she made for a price five to seven times higher than theone she was charging friends and neighbors.

They hoped to buy Ngan’straditional fish sauce and then mix it with other ingredients to produceindustrial fish sauce on a massive scale, but Ngan rejected the offer.

“There are only a fewpeople making traditional fish sauce now,” she added.

Additionally, the amount ofthe traditional fish sauce she makes each year is small.

 “If I sell all forthe firm, no one could taste the real flavor of the traditional fish sauce I’vemade,” she said.

She learnt the recipe fromher father. “All I want to do is keep the flavor of the traditional fish sauceas long as I can,” she said.

Hoang Hai Yenof HCM City said she tasted Ngan’s fish sauce when she visitedthe commune.

“I love the strong taste ofthe fish sauce so much,” Yen said.

That was the taste thatindustrial fish sauce never has, she added.

An overseas Vietnamese,born in Can Tho city’s Cai Rang district, said she bought a lot of the traditionalfish sauce made by Ngan every time she returned the city.

"Because the strongtaste of the traditional fish sauce makes me recall my childhood so much,"she said.

Vo Van Tho, head of the BuiHuu Nghia ward, said that in the past the ward had 79 households that madetraditional fish sauce. However, people shifted to do other things to earn moremoney.

Only Ngan continues makingthe traditional fish sauce, he said.

According to Tho, in 2016,the ward administration helped Ngan to borrow 50 million VND (2,200 USD) withno interest for five years so that Ngan could buy three tonnes of Siamese mudcarp and freshwater anchovy to make the traditional fish sauce to servetourists who visited to the commune as she expected.-VNA