Ca Mau freshwater area is the “Kingdom” of freshwater fishes. In addition to producing a variety of specialties made from traditional freshwater fishes such as snakehead, catfish, perch, snakeskin gourami, eel, turtle, snake, etc. the people here also produce a famous specialty from freshwater fish that few other places produce - Featherback Fish paste.
 

Featherback fish’s bones are removed for flesh.

Featherback (Notopterus) is one of the freshwater fish, with a flattened body, brightly colored scales, a low-flesh body and lots of bones. In addition to being used to prepare dishes such as fried with lemongrass, soup, cooked with sauce, Featherback fish is also used to make to fish paste. Although Featherback fish paste is processed a little picky, complicated but few fish are as tough and juicy as it is.
 

Featherback flesh before processing fish paste.

In order to process Featherback fish paste, for the quality of fish cake, fresh, live fish should be selected first. For a long time, in Ca Mau, the processing of Featherback fish paste has been mostly done manually. Before processing, raw fish should be washed with clean water mixed with a little salt to reduce its fishy smell. The fish is then drained. After that, the fish head will be removed and the fish body will be split in half to separate the 2 sides of the fish from the middle bone. Finally, use a spoon from the top to take the flesh and remove small bones.
 

Processing fish cake.

The flesh after taking will be finely minced or blended by a blender. After that, it continues to be pounded, until the flesh is puree. For toughness and sweetness of Featherback fish cakes, when grinding, it will be added a little oil, salt, MSG, pepper. The pounding duration is for 20 to 25 minutes, after this time the flesh will stick together and have a beautiful pink color.
 

Finished Featherback fish paste.

Featherback fish paste is used to make many delicious dishes such as Thai hotpot, sweet hotpot, Mam hotpot, cooked melon soup, bitter melon soup, fried, etc. The specialty of Ca Mau Featherback fish paste is that it is made from freshwater Notopterus fish, not a Notopterus Chitala or those that grow in an industrial model. During processing, Ca Mau Featherback fish cake is free from preservatives, food chemicals, no bones and the toughness and sweetness of fish are retained.
 

Featherback fish paste is used to make many delicious and attractive dishes.
 

Currently, at the wholesale markets, central markets in Ca Mau province are selling Ca Mau Featherback fish paste with a price of about 200,000 VND/kilo.