Cendol, also known as lot chong (), mont let saung (), nom lut (), lod song () and bánh lọt, is a traditional Southeast Asian dessert characterised by soft, green, worm-like jelly strands made from rice flour or mung bean starch, coconut milk and palm sugar syrup, typically served over shaved ice. The jelly is flavoured with pandan and combined with a creamy coconut milk base and the caramel-like sweetness of palm sugar. It is widely consumed in Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Laos, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, and forms an established component of Southeast Asian food culture, commonly sold by vendors at roadsides, hawker centres and food courts.
The dessert has a long and complex history reflected in regional variations that incorporate local ingredients and culinary techniques. Additional toppings may include diced jackfruit, sweetened red azuki beans or durian. Although most commonly green, it also appears in other colours, and savoury and fried variants exist. It is served during festivals, religious observances and traditional ceremonies across Southeast Asia.
History
Early Southeast Asian Culinary Traditions Known variously across Southeast Asia as cendol, lot chong, bánh lọt, mont let saung and nom lut, this jelly-based dessert has a long and complex history with multiple interpretations regarding its origins. Its basic components, including rice or tapioca flour, coconut milk, palm sugar and pandan, are longstanding features of indigenous Southeast Asian food traditions. Rice flour has been used for centuries across both island and mainland societies to produce steamed cakes, porridges and jellies, while coconut milk and palm sugar provide richness and sweetness. Pandan (Pandanus amaryllifolius) has long been employed as both an aromatic and colouring agent. These ingredients and preparation techniques predate European colonial influence and were widely established across the region prior to the emergence of modern national boundaries.
This deep-rooted ingredient base is reflected in the dessert’s broad geographic distribution across both mainland and maritime Southeast Asia. Related forms are documented among Vietnamese, Khmer, Thai and Bamar communities on the mainland and among Javanese, Sundanese, Malay, Minangkabau and Bugis populations in the archipelagic region, supporting interpretation of its development as part of a shared regional culinary heritage rather than attribution to a single ethnic or geographic origin.
Some Thai sources suggest that an earlier form of lot chong, known as nokploi, formed part of Indian-influenced culinary rituals, reflecting the influence of Hindu and Brahmanical food and ritual traditions in Southeast Asia. Historical evidence of Thai nokploi, typically served with coconut milk, dates back to the reign of King Narai (approximately 1672–1688 CE), when a typical household dessert set included four types of sweets, known as the “four-cup dessert set.
Other culinary experts link cendol to the Persian dessert faloodeh, which was adapted in India as falooda before spreading to Southeast Asia. In Indonesia, cendol is closely associated with the Javanese beverage dawet, documented for several centuries. References in the twelfth-century manuscript Kakawin Kresnayana indicate that sweet rice-flour drinks resembling cendol were known in the Kediri Kingdom of East Java. Some sources also suggest a Hakka Chinese connection, with bánh lọt potentially originating among Hakka communities and brought by migrants to maritime Southeast Asia, where it became a popular rice-based sweet beverage in tropical climates.
Names, Etymology and Early Documentation In Indochina, similar rice flour jelly desserts are known by various local names. In Vietnam, the worm-like rice flour strands are called bánh lọt, meaning “secreted jellies”, and are a common ingredient in the dessert drink chè. In Thailand, the dessert is known as lot chong (Thai: ลอดช่อง, pronounced [lɔ̂ːt t͡ɕʰɔ̂ŋ]), which can be translated as “gone through a hole”, referring to the method of pressing warm dough through a sieve into cold water. In Burma, it is called mont let saung (မုန့်လက်ဆောင်း). In Cambodia, variants include lot (លត /lɔːt/), bang-aem lot (បង្អែមលត /bɑŋʔaɛm lɔːt/), nom lot (នំលត /nɷm lɔːt/), and banh lot (បាញ់លត /baɲ lɔːt/), while in Laos it is known as lod song (ລອດຊ່ອງ). The Vietnamese term lọt is cognate with the Proto-Katuic reconstruction lɔɔt, meaning “to pass” or “go by”, which is reflected in related languages such as Pacoh (luat).
In most of Maritime Southeast Asia, the dessert is commonly called cendol. Linguistic sources suggest that the name derives from the word jendol, meaning “bump”, “bulge”, or “swollen” in Malay, Indonesian, Javanese and Sundanese, in reference to the characteristic green worm-like rice flour strands. In most parts of Indonesia, cendol refers to the green rice flour jelly, while the full preparation of jelly combined with coconut milk, shaved ice, palm sugar and sometimes diced jackfruit is known as es cendol in West Java or dawet in Central and East Java. Other regional names include cindua (Minangkabau, West Sumatra) and cindolo (Bugis, South Sulawesi).
The earliest known written records referring to cendol (spelled “tjendol” in old Dutch orthography) date to the mid-nineteenth century in the Dutch East Indies. One of the oldest documented references appears in the 1859 Makassarese–Dutch dictionary. On page 391, the entry describes “tjêndoló” or “tjêndoloka” as a type of local delicacy made either from rice or sago flour, cooked into a porridge, then pressed through a bamboo frame with small holes to form small granules. These granules were then mixed with coconut milk and consumed with syrup. An editorial note later in the volume (page 934, under “Corrections and Additions”) specifies that “het Mal tjendol” (“the Malay cendol”) should be added after the term “tjêndoloka,” indicating that the word cendol was recognised as a Malay term in the regional linguistic context.
The term “tjendol” continued to appear in nineteenth-century Dutch colonial dictionaries and cookbooks from the Dutch East Indies. A notable example is the 1866 Oost-Indisch kookboek (East Indies Cookbook), which includes a recipe titled “Tjendol of Dawet,” reflecting that cendol and dawet were already regarded as interchangeable terms at that time. Further lexical documentation appears in Jan Pijnappel’s 1869 Supplement op het Maleisch-Nederduitsch Woordenboek (Supplement to the Malay–Dutch Dictionary), where tjendol is described as a drink or semi-liquid preparation made from sago, coconut milk, sugar, and salt. Together, these nineteenth-century sources demonstrate that cendol was already a well-established preparation in the Malay–Indonesian world, recognised in both culinary practice and formal linguistic records.
In Malaya, the term “chendul” was recorded as early as 1894 in a Malay-English dictionary compiled by British administrators Hugh Clifford and Frank Swettenham in Taiping, Perak.Clifford, H. C., Swettenham, F. A. (1894). A Dictionary of the Malay Language. Malaysia: authors at the Government's printing Office. It was defined as a liquid preparation made from cooked sago passed through a sieve and mixed with coconut milk, salt and sugar. By 1932, chendol appeared among the foodstuffs available in Kuala Lumpur, as documented in the Malay Concordance Project.
In Thailand, lod chong has a long history and even features religious symbolism. The oldest known Thai recipe, found in Tamra Kap Khao Phiset by Mae Ob Chao Ka, second edition 1927, describes the dessert Narai Banthom Sin green pandan lod chong, as representing Vishnu resting in the cosmic ocean. The recipe instructs the pandan-flavoured dough to be pressed through a wide wooden mold into water, forming the strands characteristic of lod chong, demonstrating the integration of Hindu cosmology into Thai culinary traditions.
Culinary characteristics
Thailand In parts of the Indochinese region, local adaptations of the dessert emerged within the broader Southeast Asian culinary framework. In Thailand, lot chong (Thai: ลอดช่อง), has long been embedded in cultural and social life. In the 15th century, it was included in the traditional “four-cup dessert set,” a selection of sweets commonly prepared in households alongside puffed rice dessert, basil seed dessert and sticky rice. Historically, the dessert was called Nok Ploy, a name thought to reference either the process of pressing the dough into strands, which resembled the excretion of a bird, or symbolically, the freeing of the dough like a bird being released. The modern name lot chong, meaning “passing through a hole,” reflects the preparation method of pressing dough through small holes into water to form the dessert’s characteristic strands.
In addition to its culinary history, lot chong became part of Thai social life and urban culture. In the early to mid-20th century, a version known as “Singapore lod chong” became popular around cinema districts in Bangkok, particularly near Yaowarat’s Singapore Pochana restaurant. Young people would often enjoy the dessert before or after watching films, making it a symbol of leisure and urban social gatherings.
One notable version is found in Phetchaburi, where lot chong is served with sweetened coconut milk and locally produced palm sugar, which is poured over the dish at the end rather than mixed into the coconut milk, producing a distinct caramel-like flavour. Beyond its role in daily life, lot chong is also associated with festivals and traditional ceremonies, highlighting its cultural significance as both a sweet treat and a marker of Thai identity.
Vietnam
In southern Vietnam, particularly in the Mekong Delta, bánh lọt has long formed part of local food traditions, where it is believed to have originated as a simple countryside snack. Early preparations were typically sweet and served with coconut milk, reflecting the region’s abundance of rice and coconut. Over time, the dish spread to urban centres, including Ho Chi Minh City, where it became more widely consumed across different social and economic settings.
Chè bánh lọt (“fallen cake dessert”), is commonly sold by street vendors and dessert stalls in southern Vietnam. It typically consists of green bánh lọt strands and sweetened coconut milk. The dish is closely associated with urban food culture in Ho Chi Minh City and the Mekong Delta and is commonly consumed as a cooling dessert during warm weather and festive or market occasions.
As bánh lọt entered urban food culture, it diversified into numerous forms. In addition to sweet versions, it was adapted into savoury dishes, including stir-fried preparations with eggs and vegetables, noodle soups served with pork or shrimp, and mixed dishes combining the strands with plain white noodles. This versatility allowed bánh lọt to move beyond its original role as a dessert and become incorporated into everyday meals. From the south, it gradually reached central and northern Vietnam, although it remained less common in the north and was often regarded as a specialised or regional sweet.
The development of bánh lọt also reflects Chinese culinary influence, particularly from Cantonese and Hakka traditions. Within southern Vietnamese communities, the dish has been correlated with Chinese-descended groups, and related names appear in Chinese dialects, such as mi kim bac in Hong Kong, banh mat ray in Cantonese, and mi ti chuot in Hakka, which describe its shape and preparation. Chinese migrants are often credited with introducing techniques for pressing rice dough into thin strands, which were subsequently adapted using local ingredients and flavour profiles. Over time, Vietnamese cooks further expanded these influences, producing a wide range of sweet, savoury, and dry preparations that contributed to bánh lọt’s popularity in southern Vietnamese cuisine.
Myanmar