Looking for "pure gold" on Quan Lan Island

Arriving at Quan Lan Island on July 27, Pham Minh Ngoc (29 years old, Hai Phong) stayed at Ms. Hanh's house in Dong Nam village, Quan Lan commune, Van Don district. Here, she and Ms. Hanh went digging for sea worms, a specialty that was granted a Certificate of Geographical Indication Registration by the Intellectual Property Office in 2015.

Sea worms are also known as sea worms, are mollusks, boneless, reddish brown, shaped like earthworms, about 5-10 cm long. Sea worms were once a royal product in ancient times and are now considered the "pure gold" of Van Don sea area because there was a time when one tael of gold could buy one kilogram of sea worms.

Ngoc said that at first, she thought the seller was "inflating the price" because they did not look appealing. But after a morning of direct experience with Ms. Hanh, a veteran in the profession, she changed her mind. "Sandworms are expensive not only because of their high nutritional value but also because of the hard work of digging for them in the early morning," Ngoc said.

At 1:30 a.m., Mrs. Hanh prepared her tools to dig for sea worms, including a plastic basket, a few flashlights, a shovel with a steel blade about 25 cm long, and a handle made of ironwood. The total length was about 1.6 m. In the quiet, slightly chilly atmosphere, with a few lights looming in the distance at 2 a.m., Ngoc and Mrs. Hanh arrived at the sea worm digging site in Quan Lan commune.

Ms. Hanh said that sea worms are cool-loving creatures, so they can only be dug up and caught when the tide is low. When the sun rises, the ground heats up from the sunlight, and the sea worms burrow deep into the mud and sand, making them very difficult to dig out.

While Ngoc held the basket and the flashlight, Mrs. Hanh continuously groped on the sand to find the sandworm's burrow. Identifying where the sandworm burrowed was quite difficult for beginners, because they had to pay close attention to the signs and unique patterns on the sand surface. After nearly two hours of continuous digging, Mrs. Hanh caught the first sandworm.

Every time she finds a nest, Ms. Hanh uses her spade to dig deep into the sand, digging each stroke quickly and decisively so that the worms do not burrow in. It may seem simple, but digging continuously for a long time, and ensuring speed to catch the worms before the sun rises, requires a lot of physical strength and high concentration.

Because they were so focused on digging for sea worms, at around 7am, when the sun rose, Ngoc and Mrs. Hanh realized they had gone quite far from shore. This was also the time when the tide was high. On the way back to shore, there were sections where the water rose up to their chests. Sometimes they stepped into the sea worm holes, the water reached their shoulders, Ngoc panicked but Mrs. Hanh reassured them, "stay calm". "For those without experience, digging for sea worms is somewhat dangerous," Ngoc said.

Sandworms are caught naturally with a shovel and hands.

Ngoc and Mrs. Hanh's achievement in 5 hours is a basket of about 1 kg of sea worms. A kg of fresh sea worms on the market currently costs about 500,000 - 700,000 VND. Dried sea worms range from 5 - 6 million VND.

Ms. Hanh said that fresh sea worms can be used to cook porridge, grill, stir-fry sweet and sour, deep-fry, make salad... To make dried sea worms, fresh sea worms will be soaked in salt water, boiled, stretched out to dry. When using, just boil again and cut into small pieces. The most common way is to cook dried sea worms with Chinese medicine or stew chicken. In addition, sea worms are also the main ingredient to create the specialty of Van Don sea worms fish sauce.

The sandworms that Mrs. Hanh caught were used to cook betel leaf soup. The sandworms were cleaned, the waste inside the body was removed, cut into pieces and then stir-fried with onions and garlic. The chopped shallots were stir-fried with tomatoes until soft, then water was added, brought to a boil, added betel leaves and the stir-fried sandworms and seasoned.

Before MSG was available, Van Don sea worms were used to add sweetness and aroma to liquid dishes such as vermicelli, pho, soup or porridge. Therefore, the soup had a natural sweet taste. The sea worms were crispy but still a bit chewy, with a flavor unlike anything Ngoc had ever eaten.

Living in mud and sand, fresh sea worms have a fishy and slightly pungent smell like other seafood. With a lot of experience, Ms. Hanh has processed the sea worms without grit and removed all the fishy smell, leaving only the faint aroma of betel leaves.

Sandworms are also a medicinal herb in Oriental medicine, with a cooling effect, helping to clear heat and detoxify, replenish yang energy and support the treatment of some respiratory and bone and joint diseases, according to the Quang Ninh Center for Promotion and Development of Industry and Trade. But not everyone likes its unique flavor. "My uncle commented that sandworms are not as crispy as cockles, but perhaps because he himself put in the effort to catch them, he found the sandworm soup very delicious, sweet and to his taste," Ngoc said.

The natural distribution of the sandworm in Van Don district (Quang Ninh) has the scientific name Sipunculus nudus, different from the Sipunculus polymyotus distributed in Van Ninh district (Khanh Hoa), Can Gio (Ho Chi Minh City). Van Don sandworms are mainly exploited in the tidal flats along Quan Lan and Minh Chau islands. The exploitation period is from February to October, concentrated around April - July every year and only exploits sandworms with a size of 6 cm or more.

After the trip, Ngoc realized that the locals had to put in a lot of sweat and effort to get this "pure gold" of Quan Lan island. She hopes that in the future, the activity of digging for sea worms will be included in tours on Quan Lan island so that tourists can experience it firsthand and learn more about the profession and life of the locals.

According to VnExpress