ABC Soup (ABC ?)

This post is for u, Ai Yieng..

This can be said as the unofficial favourite soup of the Malaysian Chinese. It's like, people who won't or can't cook will at least know how to do this soup, cos they love it so much.

It's not Alphabet soup, it's like chicken broth... except with no celery, and it can be done with either pork bones/ribs or chicken.

Very easy

Ingredients

300gm pork ribs/bones or chicken breast with bones on

1 cup potato cubes (use boiling potatoes, never use Russet!!)

1 carrot, cut slanting

2 medium sized tomatoes, quartered

1 large red onion, or 2 med red onion, quartered

10 white peppercorns, smashed

2L water

1/2 tsp salt, or more

Method
1. Scald pork. If using chicken, leave it raw.

2. Boil water, put in pork/chicken, all the vegetables and peppercorns.

3. Simmer on med low heat for 2 hours. Turn off the heat and add salt in last.

**

This soup is very flavourful, therefore not much salt is needed. Do not add in salt too early, if not the potatoes will soak up the salt, and they will end up salty, and the soup tasting bland.

Don't cook this soup with a slow cooker, it's not tasty!!!

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Hyacinth Bean Soup

23/1/2017 : Correction:
The bean featured in this recipe was previously named wrongly as Lima bean. The actual name is Hyacinth Bean

I haven't been cooking much since June... most of the postings nowadays are back posts of what I've done in the previous weeks. Well, when one has a bun in the oven, there are always excuses that can be made at every corner, anytime, to be lazy.. kekekekeke...

Lima is five in Malay language.. This is not a Five Bean Soup..

In Cantonese it's called "pang mei dau". I think it's called lima bean, as that is the closest that I can get from the internet. It is a bean about 3-4 inches long, pale green colour with a matte surface in the shape of an eyebrow.

This is my grandaunt's favourite soup and she'll eat a lot of the beans because she believes this bean enhances our eyesight, and with that she claims the reason for her being able to thread a needle at 90.

1 1/2 cup lima beans (correction : Hyacinth Beans)

300gm pork ribs or just meat (scalded)

10 peppercorns

1.5L boiling water.

Salt to taste

Trim the beans by discarding the top bits and pull away the top ligament.

Boil water, put in everything to simmer for 2 to 3 hours.

the Lima Bean.. I think

The beans are out of the pod after being boiled...

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Watercress Soup ????

The Chinese boils watercress for soup or for a cooling drink (liang cha). While Westerners use raw watercress for salads and sandwiches.

Watercress in Malaysia is not suitable for use in salads or eaten raw. Because...... they are grown in water that is fertilized by sacks of chicken droppings soaked in the ponds they are grown in. This way... I don't think one will eat raw veg bathed in chicken s**t water.. hehehehe.. lots of bacteria, and they may have a few slugs stuck between the petioles..
But hey.. without those precious stuff from the chickens, u won't get those fat juicy watercress from Camerons..

Watercress Soup recipe
300gm soup bones or ribs
250 gm watercress
6 red dates, pitted
10 white peppercorns, crushed
1 tsp salt
1.5L water

1. Trim leaves and tip off the main stem of the water cress. Keep them seperately.
2. Scald soup bones or ribs.
3. Boil 1.5L water and put in the stems, bones, red dates and peppercorn and simmer on med low heat.
4. After and hour and a half of simmering, remove stems and put in the leaves and tips of watercress.
5. Simmer for another 30-45 minutes and season with salt.


***
Usually my grandaunt will throw the stems away after simmering, saying that they are tough to be chewed. But if I'm around, she'll leave them for me to eat.

I usually see other people cutting the water cress into 2 inches length and putting the whole watercress stems in to boil together with the leaves... hehehe.. but not the way my grandaunt taught me.. she just retained the leaves and tips to be put in at a later stage .

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Cranberry Bean Soup

Cranberry Beans with Pork Soup

200 gm podded cranberry beans (300gm before they were podded)
300 gm pork (I used pork leg muscles, they looked pretty when I saw them at Tesco)
Half a medium sized dried cuttlefish ( washed & cut into smaller pieces)
1.5L boiling water
5 white peppercorns (smashed)
1 tsp salt

Just bring everything to a boil and simmer for 2-3 hours, and season with salt.




Cranberry beans in pods and podded

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Corn and Carrot Soup ??????

Corn and Carrot Soup Recipe

2 ears of corn, cut into 4 chunks
1 medium sized carrot, cut into slanting chunks
300 gm pork ribs (scalded)
1.5L boiling water
10 white peppercorns (smashed)
� tsp salt

Just bring everything to a boil and simmer for 2-3 hours, and season with salt.

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Chicken with Red Dates Soup ????

I have a grandaunt who lived til she was 96. She was the eldest sister of my paternal grandmother. My father and I were babysat by her, so were my father's siblings and my siblings. So, she was very much involved in our lives.

She cooked our daily meals until.. she was.... 90. Well, she was a healthy woman until that great power disruption of 1997. Imagine her running after us with a cane when she was 85. She could cross a busy road while on the way to church for Mother's day or Easter celebrations. Taking awards for being the oldest person in church for many many years.. **she was born on the same year Kampar Chinese Methodist Church was established, 1903.

She was a disciplinarian, taking over the role from my grandma who was busy making ends meet for the whole family. Everybody will turn up for her big birthday, her own grandchildren (lesser) and us her niece, nephews, grand nieces and grand nephews making up the majority. Her passing away brought much sorrow to our family... most of all to my small ku cheh.. hehehe.

Memories of her remain.. We miss her cooking a lot. She could cook many dishes that none of us could ever recreate.

This soup is one of it. My favourite soup from grandaunt.

Chicken and Red Dates Soup Recipe

Ingredients:

• 400gm chicken (abt 1 quarter bird)
• 15pcs red dates
• 1.5L water
• 1/2 tsp salt.

Method.

1. Boil water.
2. Remove skin from chicken.
3. Hit red dates with the side of a cleaver and remove seeds.
4. Place chicken and red dates into boiling water and simmer for 3 hours.
5. When ready, season with salt. Pepper is not necessary.

**

I made this with a slow cooker, 4 hours on high. Heating up slow cooker, put in chicken and pitted red dates, then pour in boiling water.

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