Do you always remember the first time you tried a new food? With common staples like hủ tiếu, bún riêu or cơm tấm, that might be difficult, but I can recall exactly the first time I had bánh giò: it was from a bike vendor with a very distinctive northern-accented street call of “chưng, gai, bánh giò.”
Like its siblings bánh chưng and bánh gai, bánh giò is a dish of northern descent, albeit one that has integrated seamlessly into the national snack landscape over the past decades. Today, one hankering for something simple but filling can seek it out anywhere at any time, but when I was a child in the 1990s, northern vendors on bicycles would be the most common way to get our hands on a bánh giò.
On the back of a rickety bike that had definitely seen better days rested a huge plastic rucksack that felt hot to the touch. Inside, rows of leaf-covered bánh sat waiting for their turn to explore the outside world. As he briefly unfurled the bag to pick out bánh giò with tongs, the steam turned my glasses foggy and filled my nostrils with the familiar grassy scent of banana leaves.
A classic bánh giò is made up of a rice-based dough coating a filling of pork, shallot, and mushroom.
Those neatly wrapped leaves would become a clean surface to enjoy your bánh giò, its glutinous wobbly rice dough, its peppery pork filling, and its pearly quail eggs. The best case scenario should involve a spoon, but I have, on occasions, raw-dogged a bánh giò with just my hands and trusty teeth. There is no shame, because bánh giò is not a food designed for decorum and fancy cutleries.
I think bánh giò can do no wrong. As an adult man, I have to admit one is not enough for a full lunch, so you can always eat two or three if you so wish. However, to me, it is irrevocably the perfect snack made for the moments in life when you’re peckish but don’t want a whole bowl of phở: for breakfast; as an after-school, pre-dinner ăn xế; or especially as a stomach soother after a night out drinking.
Bánh giò makers are still around today if you know where to look, but the most accessible way to get them is no longer mobile vendors, but convenience stores. Thọ Phát, Saigon’s very own bánh bao maker-turned-entrepreneur, started mass-producing a version tailored for the convenience of modern retailers, and those leaf-wrapped pyramids began appearing in steamers at FamilyMarts and Circle K’s, further consolidating its role as a convenience, hearty, filling snack.
A maximalist “full-topping” version of bánh giò in Hanoi, featuring various types of sausages and pickles.
In December 2025, the company announced that it would sunset the old leaf-wrapped bánh giò version and switch to a new plastic mold, effective immediately. The reasons given included improved hygiene, convenience, and shelf life. The plastic version retains the pyramidal silhouette, and similar food filling, with a meagre banana leaf square at the bottom that can fit neatly in the palm of my hand. I personally think the mass-produced version, leaf or plastic, has never held a candle to bánh giò by independent makers, but it has taken a turn for the worse after the removal of leaves. Their grassy aroma contributes significantly to the eating experience and their broad surface helps the content retain moisture; without leaves, the dough is stodgy, monotonous, and miserable.
It is perhaps histrionic of me to decry something as seemingly simple as the recipe change of one company. After all, traditional bánh giò are still coming to life every day from kitchens from north to south, and a plastic makeover might not spell the demise of a time-honored delicacy, but it is still very clearly yet another example of the enshittification of modern life that’s unfolding right before our eyes. Shrinkflated chocolate bars, paywalled app features, synthetic fibre replacements in clothing, and now plastic bánh giò — these are all signs of corporations making our lives worse for the sake of profits.
Thọ Phát's bánh giò with plastic packaging.
I haven’t seen our bánh giò bike vendor in 10 years and now satisfy my cravings with ones from a store specialized in northern foods on Nguyễn Thiện Thuật. He could be too old or too sick to continue the work, but I suspect the disappearance of mobile vendors is not limited to my neighborhood, but part of a much bigger shift in the country's economic pattern. It is an incredibly challenging time to operate a small business in Saigon, with stringent recently introduced tax policies, harsh sidewalk-clearing campaigns, and less disposable income from consumers in general all squeezing the profit margins dry and driving out smaller players.
I don’t know about you, but I think it is high time I seek out a nice bánh giò in this trying time. I will drive to my favorite shop, park my bike, and ask for their biggest one with the most banana leaves around it, to make up for the leafless abomination I just ate for the sake of research.
