Soups from the Far East
By Harkiran Sodhi

CHINESE soups have been a part of our meals for a long time now. Though there certainly are many more Chinese soups than the sweet corn and hot and sour soups that are the most popular here. Traditionally most Chinese soups use stock in preparing their soups be it chicken, meat or vegetable stock. Chinese soups can be of the clear variety which are light in both texture and flavour or of the more hearty variety which are filling enough to be a meal in them selves.

Shredded chicken and noodle soup

Ingredients

250 gms or 8 ozs boiled shredded chicken

4 spring onions chopped fine with part of their stalks as well

375 gms or 12 ozs egg noodles

4 cups of stock

125 gms mushrooms chopped

1 tablespoon soy sauce

2 cabbage leaves shredded

Method

Wash the mushrooms and slice them into fine pieces. In a bowl put in the boiled shredded chicken and the soy sauce and leave it for 10 minutes. In the meantime cook the noodles in boiling water till they are cooked and drain and keep them aside. In a pan put in the soup stock and bring it to a boil. Add in the mushrooms, the marinated chicken, spring onions and simmer for 3-4 minutes. Add in the noodles and the shredded cabbage and cook for an additional 2 minutes. Serve hot.

Velvety Chicken and Mushroom Soup

Ingredients

185 gms of chicken shredded

4 cups of chicken stock

60 gms or 2 ozs of button mushrooms sliced

90 gms or 3 ozs finely chopped carrots

1 teaspoon finely chopped ginger

2 spring onions chopped

1 egg white

2 teaspoons of cornflour

1 tablespoon soy sauce

1/2 teaspoon salt

Method

Put the shredded chicken and the egg white and cornflour in a bowl and mix them well till the entire egg and cornflour is well coated on the chicken. In a pan put the stock in and bring it to a boil and add in the chicken and cook for a minute or two. Add in the remaining ingredients and simmer for another 4-5 minutes till the carrots and mushrooms are cooked and serve hot.

Chicken noodle soup

Ingredients

125 gms or 4 ozs egg noodles

125 gm or half-a-cup of boiled and shredded chicken

750 ml or 3 cups of chicken broth or stock

4 spring onions chopped fine

1/2 teaspoon salt

a pinch of pepper

2 teaspoons soy sauce

Method

Boil the noodles in a large pan and when they are cooked drain and keep aside. In another pan put the chicken broth and heat it till it boils. Add the shredded chicken to it and cook for a minute or two. Add in all the other ingredients except the boiled noodles and cook for another couple of minutes. Just as you are ready to serve add in the noodles and leave in for about a minute before you serve the soup. This soup is a hearty dish and can substitute for a meal when accompanied with a salad and bread.

A few points to be noted when you are trying to cook any dish in the Chinese style is that most of the time salt will not be mentioned in the recipe and if it is it will be of a negligible proportion. This is due to the fact that most Chinese dishes use soya sauce which is very salty by itself. Due to this it would be prudent to taste the dish or the soup before you add in salt on your own.

The Chinese also often use the names short soup and long soup which confuse many people. Short soup refers to soups which use wontons (meat filled dumplings) in the soup instead of the long stranded noodles.

Chinese soups that are different to the usual are a treat as this is really the way to discover the many flavours that Chinese cuisine can present to you. Just as all our Indian food does not consist of the staple ‘curry’ that most foreigners associate Indian food with, similarly there is a lot more to Chinese cuisine than the soups we have grown up with.