jaheads

Jar heads
14:44' 08/03/2008 (GMT+7)
VietNamNet Bridge - Y Tuyen K’rong, who later became the director of the Dak Lak province’s Department of Culture and Information, once took me aside and revealed the secret recipe of ruou can, the rice liquor which is drunk from a jar through bamboo straws.

During my 16 years’ living in the Central Highlands I developed a taste for this sweet nectar and I was keen to know exactly how Ede people made such quality stuff.
K’rong explained that Ede ethnic tribe used white or violet glutinous rice mixed with yeast made from broken rice, ginger, liquorice and reed roots.Rice is steamed, dried on a large basket, mixed with the yeast and then fermented in a closed environment. Then rice husk will be added to the liquor and it will all be covered in dried banana leaves before getting buried near a forest for one year! Not exactly a process you would be able to pull off yourself at home, but still at least I knew.The best ruou can is also kept in a valuable jar according to K’rong. The most ostentatious jar he had heard of was said to be one that looked like it was made out of snake skin and was 1.2m in diameter. It was made for a man from Krong Buk district of Dak Lak and is said to have him cost two elephants. When he passed away, however, the jar was lost as well.M’nong ethnic tribe also makes a mean ruou can from roasted rice that does not apparently need to be buried in the ground. M’nong people keep the liquor in short, black jars with less handles than Ede people.
In the rainy season of 1981, I was involved in a rather lengthy drinking session in a hamlet of Ede people, about 65km from Buon Ma Thuot. I was staying at the house of the village patriarch Y B’huyt, a hail and hearty 70-year-old, whose tobacco pipe never left his lips. He explained a good straw to drink ruou can is made out of a long, thin bamboo branch or a rattan branch pricked with a thin hole.
For important ceremonies, influential families in the community might use an old family pipe which has been handed down through the generations. The straw could be as long as four metres and decorated with tintinnabulums made from porcupine tails. I also once attended the seventh ceremony to celebrate the longevity of the village patriarch Y B’huyt, a most important occasion for an Ede man. Seven large jars of ruou can and a set of 11 precious gongs were laid out in the living room. The ceremony started when the fresh water had soaked into the liquor and the woman of the house was invited to drink from the jars. After she sampled the liqour in each of the jugs then other drinkers were invited to step forward in turn, depending on their family clan status. There is always a designated server who monitors the drinking and adds water as the session continues.When one drinks ruou can, you must keep the straw in your hand until the following drinker touches it. If one breaks the pipe, you must pay a fine, usually being a fowl, nominally to Giang (the Heavens) but the beneficiary is the head of the host family. Every violation during the ceremony is viewed as offending others and/or the gods. That is why in the old days, it’s said plenty of disputes broke out between family clans or tribes as the result of a taboo at a drinking session.Today proceedings are more civil and I find it to be quite magical, sitting around, passing the straw along, sharing the ruou beside a flickering fire and listening to the sound of the happy chatter.
(Source: Timeout)