0 Soup tales

Lotus root peanut soup - my very first attempt at cooking Chinese soup! Usually I like to make Western style soups like tomato/roasted bell pepper soup but I do believe Chinese soups have certain "healing" properties when Chinese herbs like danggui and red dates are added. At the very least, all the nutrients from the ingredients would leach into the soup and thus it provides an easily digested storm of nutrients for the body.

Lotus has its roots in traditional Chinese culture (nice pun eh?), which endorse the belief that the lotus roots has 'yin' or cooling properties. Hence it is recommended for providing relief for "heaty" sickness, such as "heaty" liver and "heaty" lungs, symptoms often which include headaches, irritability and flushed cheeks. It is also believed to purify blood and stimulate appetite and nourish qi (vital energy).

I leave it up to you to decide if you believe all the above. But I know this makes one mean tasty bowl of soup! Usually pork bones/ribs are used as the stock base, but I did it with a fish stock as there wasn't any pork bones on hand. It went juuuust fine :)

Lotus Root Peanut Soup

Yield: ~ 6 servings

Ingredients

• 250g fish bones
• Knob of ginger, sliced
• 2 tsp vegetable oil
• 1 large lotus root or 2 small (~ 350-400g), sliced into 1cm thick slices
• 1 carrot (optional, for added sweetness)
• 10 red dates
• 2 handfuls raw peanuts  (30g or ~1/3 cup; I didn't have raw ones on hand and used roasted peanuts. Nothing went wrong)
• 2 L water (16 cups)

Directions

1. Soak red dates in water for at least 30 mins to soften. 
2. Soak (raw) peanuts in water for about 1 h.
3. Bring 2 L of water to boil in a large pot.
4. Meanwhile, pan fry fish bones with the ginger slices for 2-3 minutes each side with oil. This is to firm up the flesh to reduce disintegration (and the resulting icky floating bits) later on.
5. Add the seared fish and ginger to the hot water a let boil for 20 min.
6. Strain soup to remove icky bits of loose fish meat. 
7. Transfer intact fish bones into a slow cooker (or another pot). Add the sliced lotus root, peanuts, red dates and carrot (if using) into the slow cooker. Pour in fish stock.
8. Simmer for 6-8 h.
9. Salt to taste before serving.