Monday, October 26, 2009

Chinese Herbal Pork and Mushroom Soup


How about a delicious homemade soup with super powers! Mmmmm...mom used to make a big pot of soup almost every week and they are all delicious even the herbal ones.
It is the weekend, feeling overworked lately and decided to make a healthy soup. Here I made a nice hearty herbal soup. I used 2 nice chunky pork bones ( first time using these,  they are the blade bone near the neck )which gave the broth a nice deep flavor.
Ingredients:

dried shitake mushroom, potatoes, fox nuts ,wolfberries, red dates , yellow soybeans
soak all until soft except the wolfberries ( soak when soup is almost done or they will get mushy)
oh yes and garlic
look at this pretty mushroom after soaking


Here are the pork bones,
a bit scary looking but very tasty.
Parboil for a few minutes to get
rid of the impurities then rinse.
Then add bones into the pot of water with soaked
ingredients and potatoes.
Bring to a boil then lower flame and let it
simmer for 45 minutes. Then remove and take
all the meat off from the bone and add back
to the pot along with the soaked
wolfberries, simmer for another 10 minutes.

Aren't you proud of me! This smells and taste so gooooood. I will try my best to explain the wonderful flavors: a hint of earthiness from the mushroom, pork so tender & sweet, tang from the wolf berries and red dates, and the fox nuts with the yellow soybeans gave this soup a velvety finish. You can add soy or salt. Have it with rice if you like.. I just love soup and rice together ! Have a bowl of nourishing yummy tong !

You can learn more about chinese herbs from one of my favorite Soup Blogs:
Great photos and descriptions!
http://www.homemade-chinese-soups.com/chinese-herbs.html

3 comments:

hungrysmurf said...

wow! I'm going to make this tong. Were your pork bones salted? Can't wait until Molly can have soup on her own!

lishapisa said...

i did not salt the pork bones,it might toughen the meat..not 100% sure.... i guess you can. Ribs might be easier but the hind legs are tastier.

hungrysmurf said...

THANK YOU SO MUCH! I made this soup last night and we were all in heaven. I of course had it with rice and oyster sauce. John had it neat. I didn't have goji so I substituted with dried lognan. Also, the butcher sawed up the pork shoulders for me into smaller pieces so I was able to skip the removing the meat part. So happy. Called in sick just so I can have this all day!