Arrowroot and Snakehead Soup 粉葛生鱼汤

Oh hoho!!! It's not the head of a snake!!! It's a type of fish.

The Chinese believe in its wound healing properties and is a prized fish. But somehow it's a pest, called a monster fish in US. I saw it on TV and it was nicknamed Fishzilla. There are a few types of snakeheads featured in the show, the toman, haruan and some more that I dunno. Hahaha!!! The toman is really known to be fierce and it's one of the fishes that anglers love to wrestle with. I've heard stories, local stories of toman biting off hands and fingers. But not that much of haruan, which is our beloved "Sang Yue". But still, it's not a docile fish, just that haruan don't get as big as tomans, hence less "monsterous". LOL. Love my adjective!

I didn't buy this fish. It's not cheap to buy. My sis in law's mother in law gave a huge snakehead to us. I divided the fish to 3, the middle was for my kid's porridge and the tail was filleted and used to cook porridge. Whereas the upper part, the head and belly will be used to boil soup. I had no idea what soup to boil. Again, I refered to the soup book that I have, written by Chiu Sang. It didn't ask for snake head, but used dace(Laeng Yue) instead. Dace is not found here. I substituted the dace with snake head and hence this soup came out.

Arrowroot and Snakehead Soup
Recipe Source: Soups for Expelling Dampness and Heat, by Chiu Sang

Functions (according to the recipe when using dace)
Strengthens Chi, promotes excretion of excess water, expels dampness, eases muscle congestion, kills pain and boosts immune system. Snake head fish improves blood circulation, benefits the heart and calms the nerves.

500gm Snakehead fish (生鱼/haruan) )
400gm arrowroot /Kudzu root 粉葛
35gm small red beans, 赤小豆(not adzuki, it’s a herbal red bean that is longish)
50gm roasted hyacinth beans，生扁豆  (the TCM shop sells roasted variety, so I used roasted)
1 dried tangerine peel，陈皮 (about the size of 3 fingers)
Coriander for sprinkling (to mask the soup’s fishiness)
2.5L water
Salt to taste

1. Clean snakehead and cut into chunks. Fry fish chunks in a little bit of oil until the flesh is slightly golden and firm. Wash with running water to remove oil.
2. Soak both beans in cold water for 10 minutes, rinse and drain.
3. Soak tangerine peel in cold water and when the peel is pliable, scrape away the pith.
4. Bring water to boil and put in everything and bring back to a boil. Lower to a simmer for 2 hours. Season with salt and sprinkle in chopped coriander.

To get the tangerine peel, hyacinth beans and small red beans, just head to your nearest Chinese herbal shop.

Lean Pork Soup with Arrowroot(Kudzu) and Octopus 粉葛章鱼瘦肉汤

It took me almost two and a half years to reach 100,000 hits.
But after that only 3 months to another 100,000 and I reached 200,000 hits yesterday.
Really surprising.

I only tried submitting to food sites, like tastespotting or foodgawker since last month, and boy, my hits really flew faster. Sometimes up to 5000 a day, and 52 persons on my site at the same time. My eyes got so big by the impact these food sites gave me. No wonder everybody go ga-ga to post on these sites. They really bring traffic in. But if these sites declines my pics, well, I can't care much about it. It's just for fun, and the most important thing to me are you, my readers, who keep on coming back and back to support me. Thank you very much. Love ya all, MUAAAAKS!!!!

Sigh, so far less than 5 persons have interest to try out the ginger milk curd.. sigh. Nvm then, high chances for 5 persons to win 2 bowls :) But actually the main objective is just to encourage you to try out, less than 10 mins of work in the kitchen but technically challenging. I can't be giving out Books or Mixers, or fancy bakeware. I don't have a sponsor. My purse's my sponsor. If only some kind hearted companies would want to sponsor my giveaways :) kakakaka. Actually when I did the Strawberry Mousse Cones with Chocolate Ganache, the ice cream cone company's current owner is actually a friend of mine, said he wanted to sponsor me some products, I'm not sure if he's for real, but he said so. So, Gary, where's the cones :)


Anyway, here's the soup... drink drink drink


From: Soups for Expelling Dampness and Heat by Chiu Sang

Indications: Diabetes, high blood pressure, high blood fat level (I don’t have any of these…. But it’s a good soup)
Functions: It benefits the spleen, stimulates the secretion of body fluid, quenches thirst, reduced blood glucose level and reduces blood pressure.

This is the original recipe
It went like this
900gm pueraria root / arrowroot / Kudzu
19gm dried oysters
300gm lean pork
1 dried octopus (38gm)
2 sprigs coriander
Salt to taste
No mention of water amount.


My adaptation
500gm arrowroot /pueraria root /kudzu
300gm pork loin
1 dried octopus ( 1ft long, I weighed it and it was less than 20gm)
1 Tbsp dried mussels ( I don’t have dried oysters at home)
1 sprig coriander
2.5L water
1 tsp salt

Method:
1. Rinse lean pork and scald in boiling water for 3 minutes.
2. Rinse and peel arrowroot/pueraria root. Cut into large pieces.
3. Rinse the remaining ingredients. Peel dried octopus and soak it in warm water for 20 minutes.
4. Put everything except coriander and salt into a pot. Add water and bring to the boil. Reduce to low heat and cook for 2 hours.
5. Season with salt. Add coriander and turn off the heat. Serve.


Peuraria root : resolves heat in the muscles, improves the elasticity of the sinews, enhances blood circulation, reduces blood glucose level, blood pressure and blood fat level.

Dried oysters and octopus: Clear heat, ease stress, stimulate the secretion of body fluid, regulate blood flow and invigorate the sinews.

Please do not try to omit the coriander. It helps to reduce the fishiness of the octopus and the oysters or mussels that you use.