On September 23, 'Nong san Viet,' a farm-produce section run by a Vietnamese agricultural newspaper, reported that com (young-picked green rice), durian, tea and lotus seeds have come to be used as fillings in mid-autumn mooncakes. Com Moc Huyen, a maker that handles com, lines up, in addition to com-filling mooncakes, flavors of lotus seed, adzuki bean, mung bean, mochi and several kinds of nuts. The content is that local farm produce, sold either fresh or as traditional processed goods, is gaining another outlet in the form of confectionery filling. Seen from Japanese food manufacturers, it becomes a story in which, when sourcing Vietnamese primary raw material as paste or grains, there are more places to approach separate from fresh-produce exporters.
Com and durian in mid-autumn mooncakes: new faces grow beside the traditional fillings
Com and tea line up beside mixed filling, mung bean and salted egg yolk
According to the paper, the fillings of baked mooncakes (bánh nướng) and soft mooncakes (bánh dẻo) have until now centered on traditional combinations such as a hearty mixed filling (thập cẩm), mung bean filling, lotus seed and salted egg yolk. In the past few years, com, durian, tea, lotus, adzuki bean, mung bean and various nuts have been added, and versions that put several raw materials into one confection have also appeared. Durian is a smooth paste-like filling processed into it, and there are forms where tea is combined with beans and nuts. As for macadamia and cashew, the writing stops at saying they play the role of adding flavor and of broadening the range of offerings.
Com Moc Huyen has broadened com's outlets over the past five to six years
Com is an autumn gift of Hanoi and has until now been eaten as fresh com or com sticky rice (xôi cốm). Now, besides mooncakes, it also goes into ice cream, yogurt, mochi and tapioca milk tea. Nguyen Thi Thu Huyen, head of Com Moc Huyen, explains that over the past five to six years she has put com into new product lines, and states that for mooncakes, besides using com in the filling, she has developed flavors of lotus seed, adzuki bean, mung bean, mochi and several kinds of nuts. What the article's photo caption cites as a new product is a baked mooncake combining com and coconut.
What is quoted as Huyen's statement is a line to the effect that, to deliver com far and have many people come to know it, there is no choice but to put com into everyday products close to what consumers want. Reread from the buyer's side, it means the growing area is itself coming to seek out the form of processing.
What a mooncake filling must satisfy to become an outlet for farm produce
The sales floor's preferences moved first, and the growing area inserted the raw material afterward
The paper writes that a customer segment seeking raw material close to natural farm produce and a light, easy-to-eat taste has emerged. Huyen states that this demand created the conditions for putting com, lotus, beans and nuts into mooncakes. This is a place where the order is easy to mistake. It is not that the growing area invented a new use, but that, after the sales floor's preferences moved, the growing area inserted the raw material — that is the order. When the Japanese side considers the same raw material too, what is decided first is your own product planning, not the growing area's convenience.
Shelf life and variation in mass production almost overlap with the Japanese side's acceptance-inspection items
The paper writes that for mooncakes to become a true outlet for farm produce rather than ending as a seasonal fad, the raw material needs to satisfy the requirements of quality, food safety, shelf life, and stability when made in large quantities. In addition, it touches on retaining a distinctive flavor sufficient for consumers to notice the raw material's worth. These four points almost overlap with the items Japanese confectionery makers ask about when adopting overseas raw material: water activity and microbial count, pesticide residue, decay of aroma during the best-before period, and variation in color and grain size between lots. A specification arranged for the domestic Vietnamese market does not necessarily carry over as is to Japanese standards, but the raw material is ceasing to be one whose only outlets were fresh produce and traditional processed goods.
Can Japanese confectionery makers buy it as paste, grains, or powder?
The form in which it can be bought and the points to confirm differ by raw material
Rearranging the raw materials appearing in the article into the forms in which the Japanese side would make inquiries gives the following. The processing-form column is based on the paper's description, and the two right-hand columns are the writer's organization of the scenes where Japanese food manufacturers use them and the points to confirm before a quotation.
| Raw materials | Processing form the article touches on | Use on the Japanese side | Points to confirm first |
|---|---|---|---|
| Com (young-picked green rice) | Filling, fresh com, sticky rice | Green-type material for wagashi, topping | The width of the harvest season, color and aroma retained after drying |
| Durian | Smooth paste filling | Confectionery filling, ice cream, pastry | Variety and grade, whether frozen or retort |
| Tea | Combination with beans and nuts | Flavoring powder | Particle size of the powder, pesticide-residue standards |
| Lotus seeds | A blending material alongside filling and nuts | Filling, amanatto, topping | Whether the core is removed, whether dried or boiled |
| Macadamia and cashew | A blending material (no description of form) | Topping, kneading into the dough | Declaration of origin, storage conditions after shelling |
As for the two kinds of nuts, what this article writes stops at them being used as filling material and does not trace as far as the origin. It is better not to reread 'in a Vietnamese confection' as 'of Vietnamese origin.' Cashew and macadamia are also commodities where the country that does the shelling and the country that grows the trees sometimes do not match. When taking a quotation, it is best to ask first how far back, to which country's fields, the certificate of origin can trace.
A growing area that sells one crop by part already exists in Vietnam
The shift to filling material is one example of a move to draw multiple specs from a single crop. The effort in Da Lat to buy up each artichoke plant by part as separate specs is an example of giving shape to the same idea first with a vegetable. In com's case, the grain size and moisture required for filling use, topping use and powder use each differ. If you write only 'com' when making an inquiry, the counterpart will send the form it most wants to sell right now.
The price of 1 kg of paste changes depending on where it is handed over
Do not compare unit prices without deciding the trade stage
This article contains not a single unit price. You will therefore go and get quotations yourself, but the figures that come back from the Vietnamese side differ in content depending on the stage of handover. Lining up things at different stages to derive a multiple will misjudge the growing area's share as larger than reality.
| Trading stage | What is included in the price | What the buyer bears separately | Documents to confirm |
|---|---|---|---|
| Delivered at the orchard | Production cost up to harvest | Collection, transport, sorting and processing, all of it | Cultivation records, field location |
| Ex-farm (at the yard) | Harvest and primary sorting | Transport to the processing plant, processing fee | Shipment slip, method of weighing |
| Delivered at the processing plant | Raw material, processing, packaging | Inland transport, export customs clearance, sea freight | Manufacturing permit, hygiene-management certification, analysis certificate |
| Export FOB (free on board) | Delivered at the processing plant plus inland transport and export customs clearance | Sea freight, insurance, customs clearance on the Japanese side | Certificate of origin, required quarantine certificates, invoice |
| Domestic wholesale quoted price | Vietnam's domestic distribution market price | All export handling | Source and date of the market price |
Even for the same commodity, the unit price moves with the shipping season. A farm cooperative in Hai Phong that flowered lotus in the lean season and doubled the unit price over the peak season This example, seen from the side buying lotus seed as filling material, means you cannot build an annual plan on the premise of the same price year-round.
Misreading the dong's digits and separators shifts the amount by an order of magnitude
In Vietnamese quotations and local reporting, tỷ means one billion, triệu means one million, and nghìn tỷ means one trillion. Reading tỷ as a hundred million would estimate the amount at one-tenth. In addition, in Vietnamese notation a comma is the decimal point and a period is the digit separator. To give an example of the notation, '180.000 đồng/kg' is 180,000 dong per kg, not 180 dong. Because the opposite convention can be mixed in when the counterpart writes in English, the fastest way, when you receive a figure, is to read out the unit and whether it is per kg to confirm it verbally, and, if converting to yen, to have them note that day's rate alongside it on the quotation.
If you want to make it in time for next year, request the physical goods before the mid-autumn festival ends
The harvest season decides the entry point for the raw material
Mid-autumn falls on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month, and mooncake production concentrates in the weeks before it. Com is a food tied to autumn in Hanoi, and the amount that goes to filling is also bound to the harvest season. If you miss this period, you can only get the physical goods from the production line now running a year later. The situation differs when considering durian paste, and the flow in which fruit volume grew while the share of Grade-A fell, and Japanese buyers came to look at a factory's sorting capability comes into play more there. It is better not to measure, by the same yardstick, raw material decided by season and raw material decided by sorting skill.
The first thing to request is one spec sheet for one commodity
Narrowing what you request before a negotiation makes the counterpart's real strength quickly visible. If the five items below come out fitting on a single sheet, there is worth in continuing talks as a counterpart to try from small quantities.
| What to request | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| A spec sheet for the one target commodity (moisture, grain size, ingredient labeling) | Whether it is in a form that fits your own product |
| Analysis certificate for the most recent lot | Whether testing is outsourced or self-declared |
| Monthly production capacity and busy season | Whether it can be made outside the mid-autumn period |
| Which trade stage the quoted unit price is at | Whether the quotation can be lined up against other companies' |
| Storage conditions, best-before period, and aroma-retention period | Whether it can withstand transport to Japan |
Asking a maker that runs on the seasonal sales cycle for export specifications out of the blue makes talks hard to progress. The first step is to have them put out a spec sheet for just one commodity — as a raw material, not as filling. If the counterpart cannot produce that, you can simply secure only physical samples this season and defer the talks to next year's planning.
