dried cuttlefish

Pigtail Black Bean Soup

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Pigtail Black Bean Soup

The ubiquitous Pigtail Black Bean Soup. This soup is as Chinese as any soup could be. Every time I think of this soup, I am reminded of Brad Pitt. The names of the ingredients have elements of his name which seemed quite unfortunate really.

Don’t get me wrong, I love his portrayal of characters in his movies. Just that with his name as iconic as that, it seem to rhyme with the name of the soup.

Anyway, I heard this soup makes your black hair blacker and shiny. Not sure if it is true or not. I guess it doesn’t really matter as long as it is a good bowl of soup with delicious pigtails.

I bought 4 pigtails for this soup, so the flavour sure to be power. Plus I added a piece of dried cuttlefish to boost the flavour as well, so no excuse for it to not taste great. A very easy recipe especially with the thermal cooker.

Recipe

Ingredients

4 Pigtails (chopped)
1 bowl of Black Beans (pre-soaked overnight)
10 Wolfberries
5 large Red Dates
Half piece of Dried Cuttlefish
1 tsp Sea Salt

Method

1. Boil a kettle of water. Place the pigtail (frozen) into the pot. Dump in the pre-soaked black beans. Add the wolfberries, red dates and cuttlefish. Finish off with a tsp of salt.

2. Once water is boiled, add into the pot. Turn fire to high and boil for at least 20 minutes. Then place the pot into the thermal cooker to simmer for at least 12 hours. Re-boil it tonight. The soup sure nice one.

Bon Appetit!

Beef and Carrot Soup

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Beef and Carrot Soup

I am making a very simple Beef and Carrot Soup for dinner tonight. Beef provides the necessary iron nutrition for my toddler and I am pairing it with carrots because they both do very well together.

My son loves carrots, so I have added a little more carrots just so that he can mix it into his rice for dinner. I am adding a few slices of ginger, just 5 thin slices (5 being the number of Grace) just so that the beef soup would taste really nice. My maternal grandmother used to make this really nice beef and carrot soup for us kids when we visit on Sundays. So this is a really nice memory for me.

I am also adding half a slice of dried cuttlefish into the soup to sweeten the broth. Cuttlefish has that magic touch to bring the soup together and make it extremely tasty. I will complete the soup tonight with Chinese Celery. I recently discovered that food stall holders have been using a lot of the Chinese celery as opposed to the Chinese parsley for their garnishing. It appears, and I think it is true as well, that the Chinese celery’s strong flavour works very well with meats in general.

Just a simple and very easy recipe for dinner. Cooked in a thermal cooker for a good 10-12 hours so that the meats will be tender and soft for toddler and delicious for everyone.

Recipe

Ingredients

250 grams Shin Beef cubes
2-3 medium Carrots
Half a Dried Cuttlefish (really good for flavour)
Sea Salt (adjust according to your tastebuds)
5 thin slices of Ginger
2 stalks of Chinese Celery (to be added into the soup just before serving)

Method

1. As I am using a thermal cooker, I need a large kettle of boiling water for the soup. I am boiling the meat for a good 15 minutes at high heat before putting it into the thermal cooker for slow cooking.

2. I got Shin Beef cubes as they are cheap and since I am slow cooking the meats, it will be tender by the end of the day anyway, so the cheapest cuts of beef will be good enough.

3. The only thing that I need to prepare would be the carrots and ginger as the beef cubes are already prepared by the butcher, so that’s very convenient as I am always short for time in the mornings.

4. Peel and cut the carrots into bite size pieces. Then put all the prepared ingredients into the pot (just like the picture above) for the grand opening ceremony. Pour the hot boiling water into the pot and turn up the heat. Boil at high heat for 15 minutes and by then you should also be able to smell the fragrance of the beef soup taking shape.

5. Come back by the end of the day to re-boil the soup. This time, add the chopped Chinese celery and boil until it bubbles. The soup is now ready to be served.

Bon Appetit!

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Delicious beef and carrot soup